


The Cursed Demigod

by entiegon



Series: Harvey-King And Smith Duo [1]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Birthday, Camp Half-Blood (Percy Jackson), Character Death, Curse Breaking, Curse Mark, Curses, Daughter of Ares, Denial of Love, Drunk Character, F/M, Gen, Hauntings, Hunters of Artemis, Mentions of Insanity, Mutilation, My First Fanfic, My First Work in This Fandom, OC Story, Painful transformations, Poison, Prophecy, Riddles, Running from authorities, Son of Apollo, Supernatural Elements, Swearing, Underage Driving, crowbar eating satyr, divine intervention, don't give the satyr chocolate, expolsions, ghost wolves, hidden swear words, mechanical headstones, nightly transformations, prison break - Freeform, slight crowbar obsession, son of Athena
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:41:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 22
Words: 56,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26137516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entiegon/pseuds/entiegon
Summary: An ancient curse plaguing a family for generations. An evil ancestral spirit haunting the lives of his male descendants. One demigod son of the Goddess, Athena with a great destiny. Join Lee Harvey-King as he fights to break the curse and the hardships that come with his life.
Relationships: Original Character/Original Character
Series: Harvey-King And Smith Duo [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1898011
Kudos: 1





	1. Of Dragons And Snake Women

**Author's Note:**

> This story was not only my first fan-fiction in the Percy Jackson fandom, but it was also my first ever written. It is an OC story and as such, known characters within the series play a minor role. I do not own anything recognisable from the Percy Jackson series.

As if things couldn’t get worse. The last thing I needed in my life was to have some evil snake woman strangling my best friend just so she could take him home and cook him up in an extra-large cooking pot. Not my idea of a quiet day playing hoops in the park.

My name is Lee Harvey-King. And I am currently looking at one of my worst nightmares. A giant woman that was half boa constrictor. So I’ll make this quick for you. I’m a fifteen year old male with grey eyes and scruffy black hair. I ran away from home seven months ago and met my best friend, John Smith, two months later. He’s been on the run with me for three months now. We made a new friend nearly two weeks ago now, and we were planning on showing him how to play basketball today. That idea was quickly destroyed by the evil snake woman strangling my best friend. And that is where you came in.

It was still pretty early in the morning, so not many people were up and about. That was good for me. But apparently it wasn’t good for John. I leave our makeshift camp for five minutes as the sun comes up and when I return I find John struggling in mid-air, trying to get out of a head-lock with a demon. And the only thing I had for protection? Let’s see, there was the basketball which we had found in the junkyard a few blocks away, and there was that crowbar which John stole from the hardware store just so he could get me out of that cage, and then there were the twigs and branches which we had collected to make our campfire…

I took the basketball and the crowbar.

“ Hey, Granny!” I called, aiming the basketball at the snake woman’s face. “ Eat this!”

Then, with as much power as I could muster, I threw the basketball at her face. It was a goal worthy of John and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to do it again. I may be smart, but I’m not that good.

“ I’ll get you for that, you little brat!” the snake woman hissed.

My response was to charge her with the crowbar. I didn’t get very far. The reason? My other friend decided then was a great time to wake up and came face to face with one of his worst nightmares. He screamed. And not one of those war-cry like screams, either. I mean a really high pitched scream that changed into a goat’s bleat half-way through. My poor, sensitive ears will probably never be the same again.

“ Glade! Shut up!” I yelped in pain.

Glade did the next best thing. He grabbed two rather large branches that were almost as big as him, not to mention as thick as his neck. The first one he threw at the demon. He climbed up the nearest tree with the second one and managed to balance on the lowest branch with ease, cloven hooves and all.

Just so you’re clear with this, Glade Bushell is a satyr. We found him in the junkyard as well, chowing down on scraps of metal as if they were bars of chocolate. What he was doing in there, I sure as hell don’t know. What I do know is that he wasn’t an ordinary satyr. He was about as tall as a ten-year old kid, though he claimed he was twenty-three years old (human years, not satyr years), and he liked his face to be clean-shaven. He also tends to be a bit brutal when it comes to fighting…that is after he gets over the scare factor. And then he tends to get himself in trouble. On more than one occasion (and for more than one reason) I’ve wanted to kill him. This was no exception.

You see, my eyes weren’t on the tree-climbing satyr. They were on the branch that he had thrown. My immediate thought was that it was going to hit John in the head and knock him out cold. Apparently that was what John was thinking too. His sky blue eyes went about as wide as saucers when he noticed the flying mass of wood and despite the fact that he was being strangled, he tried to duck out of the way.

Instinctively I picked up the basketball which had rolled back to me and pegged it at the branch; right on the far end so that it angled away from John. I sighed out of relief. Now that it was on its new course, it was aimed at the snake woman’s head and not at John. The only problem was Glade. Screaming out a war-cry at the top of his lungs, he had done a running leapt at the demon and was now waving the second branch like a lunatic. This time I was sure John was going to get knocked unconscious.

“ Die accursed Lamia!” the satyr screamed as he flew through the air.

The good thing: I now knew the name of our attacker. The bad thing: Glade somehow managed to knock himself out with his large weapon. The other bad thing: John’s struggles were starting to lessen, which meant that he was close to passing out. And I was standing with a crowbar in my hands, wishing that it was night and I was still in my wolf body.

At that moment, when everything seemed like chaos, Glade’s first branch went point first into Lamia’s left eye and through the back of her head. Then she burst into dust, leaving a gasping John free-falling from her grasp. I dropped the crowbar and dashed under him, managing to catch him. Then I sat him down and let him catch his breath while I went to fetch the unconscious satyr who had managed to save the day.

Once I managed to wake our dazed saviour (it’s amazing what the power of scrap metal had on this guy.), I went and picked up the basketball and crowbar. Who knew when we would need them again? But I also found a snake-skin pouch with a ton of coins spilling out of it. I picked up the coin pouch and went back to the others. Then together the three of us, me with the crowbar, John with his guitar and Glade with the basketball and the coin pouch, picked up our sacks and decided we needed to leave.

But where I thought the monster was dead, guess again. Things got worse. And I instantly thought my day was never going to see a good thing until tomorrow. At the hissing sound I turned. Now there were two snake women…with two snake tails for legs. I know they weren’t Lamia, who had one snake tail, but for all I knew they could have been her spawn. With Glade still a bit dizzy from his own attack and John definitely in no condition to fight, I didn’t want to stay and find out. I grabbed hold of their arms and high-tailed it out of there.

We only paused to kick a cab-driver out of his car so that we could make a really fast getaway. John and Glade scrambled into the back seat while I took the wheel and floored it. Was I scared? With an angry, screaming cab-driver and a pair of twin snake women behind me, you can bet your life I was. I was also an under-aged, unlicensed person screaming down the roads and highways in a stolen vehicle. The last thing I wanted to see was a cop car.

Somehow we managed to get out of the city without dying. That was a good thing. The bad thing was I was that scared for my life and my friends’ lives that I didn’t want to lift my foot off the brake. And Glade screaming directions in my ear didn’t help the situation, not to mention the crunch of metal under his teeth as I realised he was slowly but sure devouring the only proper weapon that we had.

“ Dude, give me that!” I ordered, snatching the crowbar away from the satyr. “ What if we need it for the next demon that comes along and wants to make soup out of us?”

“ Sorry, Lee. I’m just stressed out.” Glade replied, sounding it too.

“ I can see that.” I grumbled.

I looked in the rear-view mirror and gave a forced smile at the satyr. He smiled back, but his brown eyes were dark and his normally smooth hair was wild. It was clear that he knew I was forcing it. And it was clear that he was pretty stressed. But for someone who had just been strangled almost to death, John didn’t look very riled up. His blond hair was neat despite sleeping outside for so long and his eyes seemed more excited than anything else. I was beginning to wonder if her was going to break into song with the perfect smile he gave me when I noticed that we were heading into a forest.

Now I usually like forests. Just not when they’re coming at me at 110 miles a minute and while I’m in a car. Bad things will usually happen. Like driving over strawberry field signs and swerving around trees to avoid them. But we all screamed when we saw the dragon. I took my foot off the brake, finally, but we kept going. The last thing I remember seeing was my reflection in the dragon’s eyes, my sad grey eyes and scruffy black hair looking at me as if I couldn’t believe that I was about to become a dragon’s lunch, then I hit my head on the steering wheel and everything instantly went black.


	2. Welcome To Camp Half-Blood

When I woke up, the first thing I noticed was the taste of my dad’s homemade chilli, bacon and eggs mash. I could practically taste the individual squares of bacon and the lumps of the scrambled eggs and the spicy sensation that the chilli left my mouth in. But when I opened my eyes, I found I was being fed something that looked like porridge by someone that I didn’t even know. Instantly, as if I had bitten into a rather spicy chilli pod, I sat up and looked around, thinking I would find my best friend and crazy satyr dead at the claws of a dragon or worse, blown to pieces by an exploded taxi car.

“ John! Glade!” I called out, hoping that they weren’t in trouble and needed me with my chewed up crowbar to come save them.

“ Hey, chill. They’re okay.” Someone said beside me.

Sitting on a chair beside the bed I was in, was the guy who had been feeding me porridge. He definitely looked older than me but I’m not exactly sure how much older. Late teens early twenties, maybe. He had curly brown hair that hung in front of his blue eyes and a mischievous smile that told me not to entirely trust him. His sharp facial features probably didn’t help either. That was also when I noticed that I was in some kind of hospital ward or infirmary, just without the IV lines and the heart monitors.

“ What happened?” I asked.

“ You were knocked unconscious.” The guy replied

“ How long was I out?” Was my next question.

“ Nearly three whole days. Hey, is it true what they’re saying about you?” The guy beside me asked.

“ What are they saying about me?” I replied, instantly dreading the answer.

“ There’re rumours going around camp saying that at night you’ve been disappearing and an unconscious wolf…”

“ Then they’re just rumours!” I said, a little too fast.

By the look on his face I was certain that I had just given away my secret. You may remember me saying something about wanting to be in my wolf body while I was trying to save John from that Lamia snake woman and the five minutes I spent away from camp. It was part of my secret. And apparently that secret was now travelling freely around some camp that I didn’t even know about as a rumour. Why couldn’t I be cursed with something that doesn’t appear while I was unconscious?

“ What? You’re cursed?” The guy asked.

I sighed. I really need to learn to keep my mouth shut sometimes. “ Do me a favour and tell me what time it is.” I said instead, ignoring the question.

“ It’s 2:30 in the afternoon. Why?”

“ Now do me another favour and shut up. Forget I ever mentioned anything about a curse, okay?”

The spark in his eyes told me otherwise. There was no way that he was going to keep my curse a secret. I was practically doomed. As in thrown out of camp and into the arms of scary snake women who want to eat me again, doomed. I got up and began looking for my crowbar and basketball. If I was going to leave, I may as well start packing now. But first I was going to have to make sure that John and Glade were all right.

“ Hey, where’re you going?” the guy said.

“ Thanks for the help and everything, but if you knew what was good for you, I need to leave. And I need to find my friends. I need to thank that crazy, crowbar-eating satyr.” I replied.

Speaking of the chewed up crowbar, I found it at the end of my bed. The pointy end was badly chewed up, thanks to the stressed out Glade, but the rest of it looked normal. I reminded myself that I was going to need to find a cloth to put on the chewed end if I was going to be taking it with me.

I picked it up and weighed it in my hands experimentally. That’s when I noticed the tuft of black and grey fur in the ‘foot’ of the crowbar. At the sight, my head began throbbing almost as if it remembered being hit by the very thing that I now held in my hands. To be honest, that’s probably what happened. Just to make sure, I turned to face the guy beside me.

“ Was this used on that wolf you claim was unconscious during the night?” I asked.

“ I think so. Katie ran out of here screaming the first night you guys showed up saying something about a wolf. Ever since then, she hasn’t wanted to come back. That’s part of the reason why we’ve been taking shifts looking after you.”

“ And let me guess, that’s how the rumours started?”

Before I got any sort of answer, the door opened. But I was pretty sure that the answer was a yes. Standing in the door was a boy about a year older than the first but they looked so much alike I thought they were twins. I also made a mental note never to cross the two of them together.

“ Hey, Connor. The meeting’s starting.” The new guy said. “ And you better bring him too.”

“ Meeting?” I repeated.

“ Yeah. We’ve got to figure out how to get you in Peleus’s good books. You drove into him and gave him a headache. Now he’s angry.”

Great. That’s all I needed. An angry dragon with a headache holding a grudge against me just because I didn’t have control over the damned taxi. With a sigh I allowed Connor and his brother to lead me to where the meeting was. I thought it would be in some big hall with a long table down the centre and chairs all around it. I never expected it to be in the rec room. Nor did I expect to see so many people, not to mention the familiar, stressed out satyr in the corner rolling a basketball between his hooves and the serious looking white horse-man that was addressing the counsel. The only two people I recognised were John and Glade, who were in the corner and looking like they were going to kill themselves with worry.

“ You should really learn not to worry, John. It doesn’t suit you.” I said, instantly gaining everyone’s attention.

“ Lee! You’re alright!” John exclaimed, jumping up at the sound of my voice.

“ And you’ve got the crowbar!” Glade added, a hungry look in his eyes.

“ No you don’t, you crazy satyr. We may still need it. Besides, I like it. Even if I didn’t get to use it. I’m not letting you eat my weapon.” I replied, an amused smirk on my face when I noticed the disappointment in his eyes.

“ So you’ve woken.” The horse-man said. I could tell from his voice that he had seen some pretty ancient things. “ I was afraid we were going to have to call Apollo down from Olympus to come have a look at you. Or maybe someone from the Counsel of Cloven Elders.”

For some odd reason, when I heard that name my eyes fell on Glade and my grip tightened on the crowbar. The satyr looked about the same as I felt; scared. In fact, he probably looked better than me. I felt like I was the one being strangled by killer snake-women and not John. My vision actually dulled until I couldn’t make out the difference between red and green, and my canines grew until they were as long and sharp as a wolf’s. This was not good.

“ I can’t go to them. I’ll kill them.” I said huskily, my voice gruffer than usual.

“ Lee, are you alright?” John asked.

I dropped the crowbar and closed my eyes, taking deep breaths to calm myself down. I even tried counting sheep, but it only made my stomach grumble. I got to about seventy before I felt someone’s hand on my shoulder. That’s when I opened my eyes again only to be blasted in the face by all the colours. Once that had calmed down and I felt over my teeth with my tongue, I noticed the scared and worried looks on everyone’s faces. The hand on my shoulder belonged to the horse-man.

“ Where exactly am I?” I asked before anyone could ask me what had happened.

“ You’re at Camp Half-Blood.” The horse-man replied.

“ Camp Half-Blood. I’m guessing it’s a camp for demigods?”

“ You are correct.”

“ How do you know about demigods?” a tall, buff girl with dirty blonde/brown hair demanded.

“ I’ve read about them millions of time. Ask me anything to do with Greek myths and I’ll tell you everything you need to know. Even things you don’t know.” I replied, my voice hardening on the last sentence.

“ Like…?” a blonde girl with grey eyes asked, her hard voice and look daring me to be lying.

“ Deeds done by a certain son of Hermes.” I replied, trying hard to contain my anger but warning her not to continue with my own wolf glare.

After a few minutes of silence, in which I took the chance to calm myself down, the horse-man addressed me again. “ Child. The gods are real.” He said.

“ I noticed from your reference to the sun god and to the home of the gods. Also because of the demigod camp and the centaur standing in front of me. I gather you’re Chiron, trainer of heroes?” I replied, trying not to be disrespectful.

“ Again, you are correct.”

“ And that stuff you gave me was…?”

“ Ambrosia.”

“ Which is the food of Gods and can destroy mortals, right?”

“ That’s right.”

“ So that means that mum was actually a Goddess, seeing as I survived. And this is not good.”

“ Why, what’s wrong?” John asked.

“ I hate the Gods. My entire family hates the Gods. My cousin was killed because of them. My grandfather went insane over them. One of my ancestors, my grandfather’s great-great-grandfather, Alejo Kaklamanakis, they had to kill him three times before he died. And I’m not joking. They tried hanging him and electrocuting him and when none of that did any good, Artemis came alone and shot him with one of her silver arrows. Going further back, Poseidon tried to drown Crisoforo Niarkhos after he killed his father, Crisotomo. He ended up being killed in his sleep by his sister, Pelagia, thus starting the Kaklamanakis line. And if you want to go back far enough, back to the Ancient Greeks, you’ll find the guy who started it all, Herodes Venizelos. As you can see, I have a bad history with the Greek Gods.”

“ I have never heard of Herodes.” The horse-man said.

“ You probably wouldn’t have. He was the last person visited by that accursed God before he disappeared.”

Thunder rumbled. Loudly. The result was that the other people in the room became extremely nervous and started looking at me as if they wanted to throw me out like a dog. And the funny thing was I would have let them. Then I felt my world shatter. John Smith, the guy who I came to call my best friend, the guy who I had warmed with my body at night and played basketball with during the day, the guy who I had fought monsters and demons with and nearly got killed by a dragon getting away from one of those particularly creepy demons, turned to face me with confusion and hurt in his eyes.

And, with everyone dead silent, he asked, “ Who, exactly, are you?”


	3. So It Begins

“ Who am I?” I repeated, my voice small. “ I’m the guy who thought you were my best friend, John. I’m the guy who helps you read. I’m the guy who managed to get you out of that boarding school without getting noticed. I’m also the guy who nearly got you killed by a dragon and eaten by a snake-woman. If you don’t want me around, just tell me and I’ll leave. I’ll learn the ways of a scavenger. They’re not hard.”

“ That’s not what I meant, and you know it. And it wasn’t your fault camp was attacked.” John replied.

“ No. It was. I shouldn’t have left camp when I did. I should have told you when I first met you. The reason why I…don’t really like Glade. It’s because…because of this.”

Slowly I pulled out a diamond vial so clear it was almost like glass. In it was a red liquid that looked like it was fighting with a golden coloured liquid and a silvery, almost ghost-like, liquid that seemed more like plasma than anything else. I thought about when it was around my father’s neck. Back then, there was no gold liquid in the vial. Thanks to me, there was. The sight of it made me sick because it flowed through me. And, like the rest of it, I wanted it out of sight. That’s why I kept it under my shirt.

When I looked up, I discovered that I had captured everyone’s attention…again. I’ve really got to learn to keep a low profile. But, I admit, as disgusting as it may seem, it did catch my eye at times. To be honest, I took one look at it, felt like I was about to be sick and looked away, trying to keep the ambrosia in my stomach.

“ What is it?” I heard someone say, I think it was Connor.

“ This? It’s the blood of Herodes, taken from the knife which killed him. The first to wear this around their neck was his son. It takes on the properties of its wearer.” I replied, quietly.

“ What do you mean?” Glade asked.

I let the vial fall on my chest and pulled the sleeve of my t-shirt over my left shoulder. On my shoulder was what looked like a tattoo of a crescent moon. Only, it wasn’t a tattoo. My father had the same crescent moon on his lower back and my grandfather had one in almost the same place as mine. The moon could be anywhere visible on the wolf body. I’ve even heard of one of my ancestors having a black crescent moon around his right eye.

“ My name is Lee Harvey-King. I’m the son of Licas Harvey-King and some unknown goddess and grandson of Kairos Kaklamanakis. And all males in my family from the time of Herodes Venizelos are cursed. The crescent moon is a symbol of that curse. And my father says that I am the one to break it. As for your dragon problem, I don’t think it’s wise that I apologise to him just yet. I’m not sure how he’ll go with a cursed boy.” I said.

But then something hit me. No, I don’t mean literally. I meant something just exploded in my mind. Suddenly I was seeing the day when I was at my dad’s work and a construction beam almost flattened us both while we were having lunch. I had ducked and rolled out of the way in time, but my father got nicked in the shoulder. In any case, we were both alive. And sitting on the barricade in front of us was a large, brilliant, silver owl that flew off before I was able to show my dad.

Then my mind went to the day I helped John get out of his boarding school. In my hand was a very intricately planned map of the school…including where all the weak points were. And it was all done by my hand. With it, I had managed to get up to John’s dorm room, sneak in, and free him from his torture. However I had made a detour to the library first and snuck out a few interesting looking books on battle, construction and Greek Mythology. But I remember seeing a large silver owl sitting on the school fence when I looked back. And something told me it was slightly angry with me.

After that, I kept seeing the owl. It was almost like it was following us. And to be honest, it was the owl that led us to the junkyard. I can’t really explain it, but it was almost like it wanted us to find and help Glade. He was kind of in a depressed mood when we found him. But we managed to pull him out of it. Of course getting to him (and getting out) was like walking through a maze of junk. And we didn’t have any bread crumbs to leave as a trail. The only thing that got us out of there was my memory. If I remembered seeing something, then I knew that we were heading in the right direction.

But then my mind found itself remembering one of my earliest memories. It was before I found out about the curse. I’d gotten my hands on one of my dad’s Greek Mythology books and was flicking through the pages, making fun of all the creatures and gods. When I came across the heroes, I pretended I was them. That poor pillow didn’t stand a chance. First it was the Minotaur, then it was Medusa, and a giant, and a Cyclops. By the end of the day it had gone through a lot of monsters and ended up in every possible corner of my room. But when my dad had found me I had the book open to an image of a beautiful goddess wearing a frilled helmet and holding a shield with a laurel on it and was stroking the hand holding the shield as if wishing I could actually hold it.

I never realised I had fainted until after I had woken up and found myself looking up at the ceiling. At first I thought that I was back in the infirmary, but then I heard voices. They were distant, but I could tell that they were close by if that makes sense. Slowly my ears tuned out the ‘static’ and I was able to make out words here and there. But then I noticed the silver owl flying in a circle over me. It was the same owl from my past. And this time I knew that it was no ordinary owl. But before I could do anything, it flew off.

“ Athena.” I mumbled, instantly silencing the arguing that was going on around me.

“ He’s awake!” the unmistakeable voice of Glade unnecessarily screamed for all the world to hear.

“ Yeah, thanks. I really appreciate you worsening my headache. What happened?” I grumbled, a little louder this time.

“ You blacked out for some reason. Are you sure you’re okay?” John replied.

“ I…uh…yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. Totally fine. What time is it?”

“ It’s been half an hour since you last asked.” Connor said.

I let that sink in. Then I stood up and began walking out the door. I had no idea where exactly I was going, but I knew I had to go somewhere badly. Then it dawned on me. I hadn’t been to the toilet for just over three days. I needed to go. I guess I had that look on my face because Chiron quickly told John and Glade to show me around camp. John made sure I knew where the bathroom was before we went anywhere else.

Once that was over, I was led over to the cabins. Twenty in all, they were shaped like some Greek symbol, omega I think it was. Yeah, omega. And what was weird was that campers who passed us kept looking at me, not like ‘oh, so that’s the new kid’ but more like ‘that’s the guy that disappears at night only to be replaced by a wolf. We better watch out for him’. It honestly freaked me out. Then there were the people saying things like ‘That’s him’ and ‘He’s the one who drove into Peleus’. I was about to go deck the next person who said that last one, but John pulled me back.

“ Don’t get into a fight with those guys, Lee. They’re sons of Ares. They will knock you halfway into next week if you’re not careful.” He whispered in my ear as he and Glade forced me into the common green.

“ They’ll have to catch me first.” I muttered, before turning my attention on the cabins. “ Which one’s yours?”

“ Big golden and glimmering.” John replied, bursting at the seams with pride and the smile to match.

“ Let me guess. With your musical talent and insane knack to want to dance over the battlefield, I would say that your father is the sun god, Apollo. Am I right?”

“ I wouldn’t say dance over the battle field. So what about you? Any idea or sign from your mum?”

“ To be honest? I think I’ve known her all my life and seen her all my life.”

“ But didn’t you say that…oh.”

He finally noticed where I was looking. The cabin was grey with silver curtains and, if I didn’t know better, the owl design over the door looked like it had taken flight recently. I half expected it to fly around the cabin and then me before encouraging me to enter. But, after a few minutes of silence, I was more than sure that it wasn’t going to happen. I guess the silver owl from the rec room wanted to go straight home after making me feel like one of those cartoon characters after getting hit really hard on the head.

When John and Glade finally managed to peel me away from the cabins (for some odd reason I was still convinced that the owl would fly off the building), they took me past the arena and to the armoury where I was fitted for my Greek armour. I have to admit, that was pretty cool. I have always dreamed about being a famous Greek warrior. I never dreamed that this day would actually come to pass. Once that was done, we continued the tour.

Before I knew it, the tour was over and everyone was being called for dinner. Some kind of horn had blown and echoed through the entire valley. Glade had to go back to his home in the forest, but to be honest I was glad that he was gone. And not because he was annoying me, but for his own safety. The sun was fading and fast. I was afraid the curse would kick in half way through dinner. But my stomach got the better over my head.

Chiron, came up to me just before the dinner actually started and told me that, unless something happened that made my mother show the camp who I was, I would sit at the big table with him. It was clear he wanted to keep an eye on me. But the entire camp would be sitting in front of him. So I refused. John talked with his cabin leader over the matter before dragging me over to the Apollo table. Man, did it feel awkward. I kept reminding myself that it was only for one dinner. But despite the hostility towards me, the others seemed to be warming up to me…I think. At least I had still John.

“ You were joking about leaving, weren’t you?” the son of Apollo whispered in my ear once we had given our offerings to the gods.

“ If you want me to, I’ll leave.” I repeated, deadly serious.

“ You’re my best friend, Lee. Why would I want you to leave?”

“ The same reason everyone else does.”

There was a few minutes of silence except for our cutlery scraping our plates before either one of us spoke again. I was well aware of the rest of the table listening in on us.

“ Was that large dog from that night really you, then?” John asked.

“ Wolf.” I corrected.

“ But it was you, right?”

“ The only time I left camp was when the sun rose and sank.”

That’s when I noticed the change in my vision. They had returned to their colour-blind like state. And I was devouring the meat like a hurricane. I quickly ran my tongue over the back of my teeth and literally heard my heart pounding in my chest. My teeth were sharpening themselves and growing. I could feel my mouth starting to change now too. My hearing was sharpening so that I was able to hear the waves on the beach clearly through the loud clatter of cutlery and I could tell exactly what every person at camp was having for dinner, though Aphrodite’s kids were messing up my nose.

I’m not joking. One stray whiff of their perfume from the other side of the pavilion and I was sneezing like crazy. When I looked up at the sky, the sun was dangerously close to the horizon. Dinner time was over. I had to get out of there. A little too hastily I stood up, instantly gaining everyone’s attention. So not good. But the on-coming sneeze wouldn’t stop. If I sneezed now, someone was bound to notice my over large teeth.

“ Lee, is everything okay?” John asked as I felt the sting in my hands and the prickling of fur on the back of my neck.

“ I’ll see you in a few minutes. Don’t come looking. I’ll find you.” I replied, my voice gruff.

Then, as calmly as I could, I walked out of the dining pavilion with everyone watching my every move. As soon as I was sure they couldn’t see me I started running.


	4. The Wolf Demigod

I couldn’t help it. I screamed. You would too if you could feel every bone in your body twisting itself and reforming into a canine’s skeletal structure. Let’s face it, curses weren’t meant to be pleasant.

I had managed to get away from the pavilion fast enough before I collapsed to the ground, my wolf legs unable to support my human body. But I feared I was still close enough for the rest of the campers to hear me. I was hiding behind Zeus’s temple-like cabin, trying to stop screaming. It wasn’t working. The pain only seemed to double.

Slowly, my grey fur sprouted over my body and my skeleton resumed its canine transformation. My face elongated, finally making room for the canine teeth that were in my mouth, and my tail sprouted from the base of my spine. My fingers and toes glued themselves together and my nails grew till they became claws. I also lost a couple of toes to the transformation of my hind paws. My ears were now on top of my head instead of on the side. And the pain was excruciating. Put it this way, if a wolf’s eyes could shed tears, mine would be doing exactly that right now. That’s how much pain I was in.

It had taken me all of five minutes for the transformation to be complete. But it took longer for me to get over the pain. So I got up and walked over to the Artemis Cabin, just to make sure that I was completely wolf in the cabin’s reflection. I was. I stood roughly about 34 inches off the ground and was about 150 cm in length. A fairly standard size for a wolf. The base of my coat was a dark grey. I had a light grey muzzle, paws, inner ears, underbelly and chest and under tail. I had black fur running down my back like a streak going from my forehead to the tip of my tail. And the crescent moon tattoo was now blazing silver on my dark shoulder. Around my neck was the vial of blood and my sad grey eyes pierced the image before me.

That was when I heard the desperate voices. Dinner must have been over. And John must have started a search for me. But then everything went quiet. My senses told me that every demigod in the valley had seen me. Slowly I turned to face them. I was right. Every demigod in the valley had seen me. As I watched, weapons were drawn and arrows were notched. I admit. I was half expecting Glade to jump between us screaming like a maniac while swinging a large club over his head. I wasn’t far off either. There was just no club.

“ Wait! Stop! Don’t attack! Lay your weapons!” the satyr screamed, running between us.

Once again, the satyr comes to the rescue. If I live through this, remind me to formerly thank him for everything. Mental note - maybe this is why the silver owl led me and John to the junkyard, because my mother knew how important a friend he would turn out to be. The Ares cabin leader stepped forward, her spear lowered and her glare like a dragon’s.

“ Glade. Move.” She ordered.

“ No. I won’t let you hurt him. It’s not his fault. Can’t you see? The crescent moon on the shoulder. The vial of blood around his neck. Don’t know realise who this is?” Glade retaliated.

Mental note number two – make sure to give Glade a box of metal chocolate as a thank you for saving my ass. I guess not all satyrs are evil. In fact, maybe it was my ancestor who was evil. What was it that Dad said he did again? Think, boy. Think. Curse …satyr …wolf …males …God …that’s it!

Herodes was cursed by Pan because he killed every wolf that dared lift a paw over his territory. And he skinned them and sold their coats, feeding his five children their remains. But his only daughter refused to eat the wolves and that was why all females of his blood weren’t cursed. It was his daughter which called on Pan and explained what was going on. The weakened Pan did this request before disappearing. Now he’s dead. Which means that only a chosen satyr can help break the curse. Now all I need to know is how to break the curse.

Okay, I admit. I got excited there for a little bit. But that quickly changed. I think I need to go act like a Greek hero wolf. I was about to, too. Until Chiron made his way through the crowd to find out why no one was tiding their cabins. When he saw me, he understood. Maybe it was the sadness in my forever sad eyes that got to him. I don’t know. But whatever it was, I think I need to thank him as well. The Ares leader really looked like she wanted to run me through and turn me into a wolf demigod shish-kebab.

“ Would you mind explaining what’s going on, please Lee?” the centaur asked, instantly starting murmurs through the crowd behind him.

 _My family is cursed._ I tried to explain, though wolf talk and human talk are two totally different things.

“ Don’t worry, Buddy. I’ll help.” Glade reassured me before turning back to the crowd. “ Lee said that his family is cursed.” He translated. Since when did he speak wolf?

“ What?” Someone called in surprise.

“ How’s that…” Another started.

“ Is he even a demigod?” one of the Ares kids asked.

That got to me. My ears laid back and my hackles raised, I let loose a deep growl that instantly silenced everyone. Glade didn’t need to translate that. They seemed to get the message easily enough that I was a demigod.

“ Then who’s your godly parent?” A girl with blonde hair and grey eyes asked, though we both seemed to know the answer.

 _First, my family has been cursed since the time the God Pan went missing. This is my burden to carry for my ancestor’s evil. Only those of male descent are cursed, though. My father is the same as me, a cursed Greek. And every night he prayed that he find the answer to breaking this infernal curse. Every night he prayed for me; a son to be blessed with the knowledge of breaking an ancient curse. Not a daughter. One night, his wish came true. He was a wolf at the time, but still he picked up my basket and carried me inside. And watching in the tree in our front yard was a silver owl. The owl of Athena._ I replied, Glade translating despite faltering at the role of his beloved God in my story.

As I said this, I looked over to the Athena cabin…my mum’s cabin. Silence followed and I’ll bet you anything that the rest of Athena cabin were working their minds over time trying to understand why their mother would give birth to a cursed demigod. Trust me; I was thinking the same thing. I guess someone had to be the experiment. Glade must have heard me (or sensed the confused disappointment I was feeling, if that makes any sense) because the next thing I knew, muscles tense and everything, he was digging his hands into my fur and trying his best to comfort me.

“ Don’t worry, Lee. We’ll work something out.” He whispered so that only I could hear him.

“ So, that was eventful.” I heard someone mutter before I heard a collection of gasps.

I didn’t know how Athena let the other demigods in the camp know who was her child or not, but I was pretty sure this wasn’t it. However I dare not turn around or even look up for fear of doing something stupid. Even Glade moved away, but he kept a hand on my shoulder. And, to be honest, I was glad he did. I probably would have freaked at the sight if there wasn’t something to keep me semi-calm.

I only turned around when I heard Chiron call out “ All Hail, Lee Harvey-King. Son of Athena; goddess of reason, wisdom, battle, strategy, arts and craft.”

Every camper was bowing before me. Even Chiron was bowing. Glade wasn’t. He probably would have if he hadn’t sensed that I was about to flee. Come on. Who in their right mind would stay when a whole bunch of half gods with weapons once aimed at you were now bowing at you. You would take that chance to run and hide somewhere. After about a minute, the centaur straightened himself and looked at me.

“ There will be a game of capture the flag tomorrow night, Lee. Now I understand your predicament, but I expect you to be there. In the meantime, I’m sure we can work something out for your…uh…bed.” He said. “ Now, get cleaning. All of you. The sing-a-long is starting in fifteen minutes.”

That got everyone moving. They hurried over to their various cabins and began tiding up, leaving me and Glade standing awkwardly in the green. The Ares campers looked like they wanted to kill me as they passed me. I guess they couldn’t wait to get me in tomorrow night’s game. But like I told John earlier, they’d have to catch me first.

“ You better get ready too.” Glade told me, quickly moving his hand away from me.

Before I could say or do anything, he shot me an awkward, ear-wiggling grin and disappeared into the dark. I hung my head and sighed. Yes, sighed. I know wolves can’t really do that, but you’re forgetting I’m a cursed human. I do retain some human tendencies while in wolf form. They’re what keep me human. Anyway…

Slowly I walked over to the Athena cabin and poked my head through the door. Instantly I thought I was in heaven. There were books. Lots of books. And maps, too. The walls, desks and ceiling were covered head to toe in maps and plans. 3-D models and diagrams also had a place in the cabin. Not to mention scrolls, building materials, craft items and, yes, the odd suit of armour. Like I said before, I was in heaven. And everyone was cleaning. I guess they really like the sing-a-long. It wasn’t until later that I found out they didn’t want to get caught by the cleaning harpies, in fact no one did.

“ Oh, Lee! You startled me.” The girl who asked about my godly parent earlier said.

I lowered my ears and tilted my head in confusion. Athena was supposed to be smart, so her children were too. But then I realised they were still trying to get over the fact that I was their cursed half-brother. I guess seeing the wolf head of your newly discovered half-brother poking around the door to your cabin was pretty startling. With this new thought in my mind, I lowered my head and whimpered slightly. I didn’t know what else to do. Glade wasn’t with me to translate, this time. And like I said earlier, wolf talk and human talk were two totally separate forms of communication.

I was actually getting ready to walk out again when I realised that my siblings (that’s just strange saying that. I’m an only child) had stopped what they were doing and were looking at me, once again like they couldn’t believe that I was their half-brother. But this time I thought I noticed the tiniest glint of pity in their grey eyes. And it seemed like I was the only non-blonde child of Athena in the cabin. Once more I felt like I was the odd one out.

We kind of just stood there looking at each other, wondering what to do, when I heard something scratching at the floor under one of the bunks. My interest sparked, I looked over to the bunk. Well, under it actually. I hadn’t moved my head from its lowered position yet, literally giving the puppy-dog eyes effect. What I found under there was probably the world’s biggest remote-toy spider. And you know what? I actually perked my ears up in excitement.

Now here’s what you’re probably thinking - I’m insane. Children of Athena are supposed to be scared to all Hades at anything that so as resembled a spider. And I probably did feel some kind of queasiness in my stomach at the sight. But I ignored it. The reason? My dad loved to torment them…especially in his wolf form. I took pity on the little creatures that would scurry away from his massive paws or the things he would use to prod at them.

Okay, I admit. They were frightened of me as well. I would pick them up and play with them when I was younger, but I would always let them live afterwards. Once my father was bored of them, he would usually kill them…or eat them if he was hungry enough. Yes, I know. Gross. But he only started that when things began to get really rough for us. I wouldn’t touch them, though. Anyways… I instantly knew this one was a toy because of the fact that it just looked fake. Seriously, it had no eyes. And no scent. So, being me and an over large canine that needed some less-murderous excitement, I dashed under there and picked it up, dragging it into view of my fellow cabin mates. Bad move.


	5. A Gift from Mum

At the sight of the struggling remote controlled thing in my mouth, everyone panicked. So much for first impressions. But that was when my tongue felt the odd shape of a small video camera strapped to the toy’s back and I smiled. Whoever this toy belonged too, they were getting the best view of my mouth anyone other than a dentist would have along with the slobbery effects that go with it.

The only problem on showing the others was that they would freak out. More than what they were already doing. So, instantly, my head began calculating every speck on the toy from when I had seen it. And I formulated a plan. Right down to the fact that I would probably get myself electrocuted if I continued. I took the risk.

Very slowly, I lowered my head and placed the toy on the ground. This, of course, caused quite a panic amongst the rest of the cabin. But I had not let go of it, so I was still in some form of control over the controller. Then I bit into one side of legs, ripping them out and spitting them on the floor. Let me tell you now, they tasted disgusting. I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to get the taste out of my mouth for at least another week. Then I looked up.

The rest of the cabin was still freaking out, but the remote control spider wasn’t going anywhere. It was trying, but it wasn’t succeeding. Four of its robotic legs were missing making it spark and do what looked like some kind of new break-dance move. I thought it was funny. My cabin mates didn’t. So I ripped out the four remaining legs forcing it into permanent restraint. Then I realised that the feelers were also freaking my siblings out, so I ripped them out too. By the end of all this destruction, the only things left attached were the body parts and the tiny camera that looked like it was welded into the abdomen. Great. How was I going to get that off the remote control toy?

Naturally, I inspected it. Then I left it there and picked up the mess I made and put it in the bin, thinking about how I was going to rip the camera off the already destroyed toy. I wasn’t exactly in the right kind of form to go prizing it open. So, on painful torment from my mouth, I latched my teeth around the camera and bit down, practically ripping it off the toy. Then, only for my safety, I dropped the camera at the girl’s feet and kicked the toy outside.

“ Is that what I think it is, Annabeth?” One of the older boys asked, getting over his scare.

I have never seen anyone go that red in my life, until tonight. Annabeth, the girl who I had startled and had given the camera to, was way more than furious.

“ Travis and Connor Stoll!” She roared, making me cower to the ground with my paws over my ears and begin whimpering.

I honestly thought she was going to kill someone, namely me because I was the one who exposed the toy. But then the name Connor flashed back to me and I immediately got an image of the boy who had been with me when I had woken up; the one with the mischievous look on his face. I also remembered that one of the Olympian Gods absolutely loved to get into mischief and it quickly became clear that these Stoll brothers were that God’s sons. I guess when it came to the gods and their children, the family traits were almost identical.

But then I was pulled out of my thoughts by the sound of a horn blowing. It was the same kind of horn that had sounded before dinner, but unlike earlier it pierced through my head and made me yelp in pain and surprise. I guess I must have sounded like I was afraid that Annabeth was going to kill me because she calmed down and laid her hand on my head. _So hating this curse at the moment._ I thought to myself. _People wouldn’t treat me like a pet or worse._

“ I didn’t mean to scare you, Lee.” She said, before calling everyone into line and leading the way to the amphitheatre.

I watched them go before turning around and placing the camera on the nearest bed, hoping that it was Annabeth’s bed. Then I did a quick look around to make sure that the room was clean before dashing out of the cabin after my siblings. I caught up with them easily enough near the canoe lake. In fact I actually ran past them and had to stop after realising that they were now behind me. Guess I got a little carried away in the run. Whoops.

Anyway, after Annabeth practically ordered me to stay with the rest of the cabin, we made our way to our bench at the amphitheatre. The Apollo kids were already on stage and warming up their voices, getting ready to sing. I wondered if I should do the same, but decided better of it. It would probably ruin John’s big performance. And he would probably kill me if I did that, not to mention what the rest of his siblings would do to me.

Pretty soon the songs began and we all started singing. Well, everyone except me. I just sat there and listened, memorising the lyrics to each song for if and when I finally managed to break the curse and enjoy a sing-a-long campfire.

But I couldn’t sit still for long enough. I guess my ADHD affects even my wolf form. I never really noticed it until now. There was so much going on around me and so much that I was missing out on that I honestly began to feel left out. So much so that I began whining. And that in itself nearly got me in to serious trouble from John let alone the other campers.

So I tried to quieten myself and find something else to do. I tried sitting still. That didn’t work. I tried dancing to the music wolf-style. That ended when I got an itch in my lower back. Hades, I even tried falling asleep. The only good that did me was get me annoyed with the singing because I like quiet when I sleep. I was not having any luck at all.

I got up, walked around a little bit, sat down and scratched at an itch in the middle of the walkway, walked through the stands and freaked out the Aphrodite kids, and finally went back to the Athena stand growling to myself when Chiron noticed me. Annabeth took pity on me. She tried comforting me about all of this, but it really didn’t do much. So I went back to my random acts of trying to keep away from boredom.

Again I walked through the stands and freaked out campers…and got told off by Chiron again. But this time my growl was slightly louder. In any case I went and sat with the Athena cabin and decided that I was going to sing regardless of what the others thought. So I raised my head and howled of my life and curse. It was my own song, true. But I was the only one who actually knew the lyrics. Let them feel what it was like for me.

As expected, I ruined the sing-a-long. One of the Ares kids came up to me and wacked me hard across the head to shut me up. I retaliated with a yelp and bit them in the arm with a growl. I know, I know. I’m already enemies with the Ares cabin, why make things worse? But let me tell you something. As much as I was sick of being a wolf, I was also sick of animal cruelty. And what Ares fellow did was animal cruelty. Like, come on! I’m a protected animal!

I only let go because John came up to me and scolded me, complaining about me stooping to new lows or something like that. Not even Chiron or Annabeth could get me to let go, which was saying something because most of the campers were afraid of the Athena cabin leader. The Ares kid threatened to kill me in Capture-the-Flag tomorrow night, but I just growled back my answer from before. I would be very impressed if they could outrun me.

Once that bit of drama had calmed down a little, the singing began again. I felt bad about having ruined it. Then again, I ruined a lot of things. But then I noticed the flame of the campfire. There was nothing unusual about the colour except that it was duller than usual, perhaps because of the weariness in the other campers at having me destroy their fun. It didn’t matter. What did was the little girl that was tending to the fire. I got the feeling that she wanted me to sit with her by the fire, so I ignored the eyes of the other campers and sat looking into the flames, next to the young girl who had beckoned for me to join her.

 _Miss._ I acknowledged the girl in wolf talk, though I didn’t understand why. I just felt like I should respect her.

“ Respect is a virtue.” The girl said. “ Welcome to my hearth, Lee Harvey-King, cursed son of Athena.”

 _You didn’t need to put it that way._ I grumbled, not understanding how she could understand me.

But then again something was different about the girl and I couldn’t quiet put my finger…uh, paw…on it. When I turned to face her, I noticed that she looked more like an immortal than a young girl. In fact she looked more like a young woman than a young girl. I thought my eyes were going funny, but then something stirred within me saying that I was not going crazy. And that was saying something. My life was already crazy.

“ I’m sorry if I upset you.”

_No! No! It was my fault for sounding rude. I didn’t mean for it to come out that way. It just…_

“ Peace. I understand what you are trying to say. You’re a kind boy, Lee. A kind boy treated badly because of something that is not your fault. Tormented by your father’s curse. But know that you have a home here as well. Your family will come to trust you better once they realise what you possess.”

_I wonder about that. Nobody trusts a wolf._

“ Tell me a story. About your life before now.”

I obliged. What else could I do? I was almost certain that I was sitting beside the goddess of the hearth so I couldn’t just turn down her hospitality by turning away from her. I wasn’t like that. So I turned back to the fire and gave another sigh.

 _I was told, when I was younger, that my mother left my father while she was pregnant with me. He said that she left because she had seen him transform into his human form one morning and warned me never to speak of her again. And the only time he ever saw her again was the night when she left me, a crying baby in a golden basket, at his front door. But as I grew up I learned and eventually discovered the truth of my mother. Well, I discovered that she hadn’t really left me or my dad even though I’ve never seen her face to face before. In any case, my father began to get angrier and angrier at me for taking up an interest in Greek Mythology and such like that. It got so bad that one day I left. For months I was on my own. Then I met John. We became fast friends…then he had to go back to boarding school. I still stood by him, though, and managed to break him out. A couple of days later, while we were looking through a junkyard for the satyr, Glade, he said that he had received a guitar for his birthday from his dad. He also said that he never knew his dad which made me remember how I felt about my mum. We found Glade and eventually found ourselves here._ I said feeling awkward about the story but not feeling awkward about telling the goddess.

“ Most demigods, sadly, do not get to see their godly parent face to face. But that does not mean that they do not love you. Your mother wanted you to have this.”

And this is where I received the very first actual gift from my mother. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect of it; maybe a watch or something like that. But I definitely wasn’t expecting this. Hestia, goddess of the hearth, had placed in front of me a crowbar. A crowbar! And not just any crowbar. A pure bronze crowbar with an intricately carved design and a soft leather grip in the centre. Wow. How was I going to survive with just a crowbar?

Now don’t get me wrong. I liked it. It was the first gift my mother had actually given me that I remembered being given, even if she couldn’t be the one to give it to me. She must have been really busy or something like that. But still I sniffed at it, almost wishing that it was something slightly more, I don’t know, battle worthy.

That’s when the crowbar shifted form into a Greek sword and then into a double bladed pole arm that I could easily carry in my wolf mouth. And it was just the right length so that I didn’t accidentally stab myself. The only thing that remained the same was that it was bronze and had intricate carvings. I mean, WOW! My mother really does think of everything.

A clap of thunder sounded above me and an owl hooted somewhere nearby. Whoops. Didn’t mean to upset anyone. But just then the double bladed pole arm glowed gently and somehow attached itself to my right foreleg. When the glow dimmed, I was wearing a soft leather cuff bracelet with bronze carvings and bronze clips. And this time I noticed, if I concentrated really hard on the designs, that they resembled the crowbar, the sword and the double bladed pole arm. But more importantly I noticed the Ancient Greek letters.

 _Kleitos._ I thought. _Famous._

Maybe one day I will be famous. The cursed demigod who uses a crowbar to fight supposedly mythical monsters. Maybe I’m already famous as the only demigod cursed from before they were even born. That could happen, right? In any case I chose to think of Kleitos as a positive in my life. I’ll be famous within my family because I would be the one to finally break the curse which bounds me to the body of a wolf by night.

By then I was getting tired. I tried to hide it from the goddess’s sight, but the yawn just happened. But Hestia did not question me or scold me or even laugh at me. She merely smiled at me and placed her hand on my shoulder, instantly filling my body with warmth. By the time I realised that Hestia had moved her hand and returned to Olympus, I realised that I was the only one left in the amphitheatre. Why didn’t anyone come and tell me?!

With a peaceful warmth surrounding me, pride at the fact that I now knew at least one person who cared about my lack of a family and the joy of finally receiving something from my mum, I hurried back to the Athena Cabin. Of course the fear of being caught by the harpies sped me up a little bit too, but other than that and the fact that I was under the cover of darkness, I managed to get back in safety. Unfortunately the door was closed and everyone was asleep which meant that I spent the night sleeping outside.


	6. I Become The Camp's New Alarm Clock

I will always know when the sun is rising. My own voice would ring in my head, my ears and the surrounding area. The next morning was no exception. The only good thing about transforming while you’re unconscious and practically in a coma is that you don’t feel yourself transforming. The bad thing about it all is when you are only asleep and get woken up by excruciating pain raking through your entire being.

Five minutes of howling/screaming in pain. Everyone stormed out of their cabins dressed in a combination of pyjamas and armour and wielding an assortment of weapons from daggers to spears and, yes, even a pen that turned into a sword. Even Glade showed up wielding the old, chewed-up crowbar (I was surprised he had kept it and not eaten it). But I was in too much pain to even register what was going on around me.

In fact I don’t even remember hearing everyone rushing out of their cabins, puking at the sight of me or screaming out my name. What I do remember, when the transformation was complete and I finally managed to stop screaming, was that there were a lot of shadows surrounding me and I was breathing heavily. And the only thing going through my head was why I didn’t wake up earlier and move away from the cabins before it started. My only answer would have been because I was still pretty drained from what had happened the last few days.

“ Okay. That was sick.” I heard someone complain softly, but I couldn’t figure out who it was or where they were.

“ Lee, are you okay?” A female voice said close by my head. I think it was Annabeth.

“ Give him some space, people! He needs air.” A more familiar voice ordered.

Of course, all this went buzzing through my head in a daze. Thanks to the now residing pain, I was completely confused. I didn’t know where I was or who was around me. I just knew that I had to keep breathing and not move. I felt a twitch in my jaw and then another in my knee but thought nothing of them. They were just side effects of what I had just gone through. But then, almost as if it were habit, my hand snatched at the vial around my neck.

Good. It was still there. If it was smashed before the right time, then there would be no hope for breaking the curse. Slowly I let the vial go and moved my hand back to the ground so that I could try and get myself up. Once I was on my hands and knees, I began coughing for a little while. But I was finally able to sit up and focus my eyes on the campers wearing pyjamas and armour and wielding weapons.

“ Wha…?” I tried to speak, but my mind and voice were still a bit fuzzy.

“ That’s what we want to know. We were all woken to you screaming.” John said beside me.

“ It even reached the forest.” Glade’s voice added.

“ Scream…oh, fudge.” I muttered, my voice getting stronger. “ I told you my family was cursed.”

I tried standing up and immediately started swaying. John caught me. “ Easy, Lee.” He said.

“ I’ll be fine. Just give me a few more minutes.” I replied.

About a minute later I closed my eyes, shook my head a little and pulled myself off John. This time I managed to stay up without swaying or any of that sort. I turned to face my cabin, who were the only ones not completely out of the cabin because of me, and noticed the scared, worried, disgusted and slightly tired looks of my siblings.

“ Sorry about last night. I was feeling a bit left out and useless so I went over to the campfire. I ended up getting a gift from Mum.” I said before turning to find Glade. “ And Glade? You can keep that crowbar that you decided was so tasty. I have my own personal crowbar now.”

“ Serious?” the satyr asked.

“ As long as you don’t devour it before you even get to use it against a real monster. Let it at least have that privilege before it gets eaten.”

“ Deal.”

“ Uh…you do know that it is an inanimate object, don’t you?” John asked, apparently worried for my sanity.

“ If it weren’t for Glade, I would have charged the hungry snake-woman with it just to get you out of her grasp. I also took it off him when he started eating it in the taxi. You never know. There may come a time when we need two crowbars instead of one.”

“ What is it with you and crowbars?”

“ I use to play with them when I was a kid. And they were great chew toys when I was in wolf pup stage.”

Again my thoughts travelled to the day I had used my pillow as about a million different monsters. The weapon, you can probably guess, was a crowbar. Now those were some fun times. And now they were just going to get better because I had a magical bronze crowbar with the name _Kleitos_. And it came with its own sword and double bladed pole arm for the really nasty fights and the guise of a cuff bracelet.

“ You played with a crowbar? I thought only Hephaestus’s kids did that.” Someone from the crowd muttered.

“ What a lame excuse for a weapon.” You can guess whose child said that.

“ Wanna bet?” I asked.

I spun around so fast I actually thought I was going to pass out. But in my hand was a bronze sword with intricately carved designs. My cuff bracelet was gone so I figured that all I had to do was think of what weapon I wanted out of the three forms for it to come to my hand. For a second there, I thought that I could turn it into the pole arm. The sword shimmered, like it was trying to do my request, but remained a sword. I guess the pole arm is _only_ for night time use. I’ll see if I can fix that when I break the curse.

But when I looked up, I thought that the world was going to swallow me whole. And I think the child of Hades would have willingly obliged if I asked him. Because about this time I thought I was going to die. I swallowed hard and was actually tempted to return _Kleitos_ to my wrist, that’s how bad it was.

Yeah it was a child of Ares. That was clear from her anger at having my sword at her throat and her dark eyes flaring with hate. But there was just something…different about her. She had golden brown hair and held a dagger in her hand like she was just that second too late at pulling it out. And, aside from the fact that she really wanted to kill me there and then, her brown eyes had a hint of red in them that reminded me of a red poppy flower that’s a symbol of those lost at war. She was…cute. Even if she was wearing pink Felix the cat pyjamas.

 _Dude! Snap out of it! Don’t even go there!_ Something in the back of my head screamed out in protest as it analysed the situation.

I seriously thought about strangling myself at that point. I thought my life was crazy before, what with the curse, my mother being an Olympian Goddess, and one of my friends being a crazy goat-man with an iron deficiency and height problem. Now add the voice screaming orders in my head and the hot daughter of the war god standing in front of me looking like she seriously wanted to rip me in half. My life had now just officially been declared insane.

Somehow I managed to calm down a little, just a little, but it was enough to make me lower my sword and return it to my wrist. And just in time too because Chiron came galloping down from the Big House at that moment. Where had he been during all the screaming that had lasted five minutes and finished five minutes ago?

“ See you on the battle field.” I whispered as I regained myself and the crowd parted in front of the centaur.

“ Definitely, wolf-boy.” The daughter of Ares replied, placing her dagger back in its scabbard.

“ Can someone please explain why you are all surrounding Lee?” Chiron asked, sounding and looking tense.

“ I transformed.” I replied simply.

“ And it sounded and looked very painful.” A Hermes kid said.

“ And disgusting.” An Aphrodite kid added.

“ Can’t help it. Sorry.” I grumbled.

“ Just as long as nobody is hurt.” Chiron said, then he walked away.

“ Yeah. Nobody gets hurt. I’ll remember that the next time I decide to aim a sword at an Ares’ throat.”

After that, the campers went back to their cabins to get ready for the day. John and Annabeth both shot a warning look at the Ares cabin and then at each other before looking at me. I still felt like I was about to get swallowed up by the earth. I probably looked like I was about to faint because they decided to force me into the Athena cabin and sit me on the nearest bed, Glade right behind them. The only thing I could think about was the Ares girl.

“ What were you thinking, challenging Ares?” John growled.

“ They challenged me first, last night.” I replied, though my voice sounded different, further away from me.

“ But, seriously. Pointing a sword at one? Where did you get that sword anyway?”

“ Mum gave it to me.” I replied.

“ Your mother gave it to you. And where is it now?”

“ On my wrist with the crowbar and the double bladed pole arm. It’s called _Kleitos_.”

“ You’d think this guy’s a son of Ares with the way he’s talking at the moment.” Glade grumbled.

“ Glade, shut up.” John growled.

“ Lee, are you feeling all right?” Annabeth asked.

“ I have no idea.” I replied, still thinking about that Ares girl. “ Who was that anyway?”

“ Her name is Karla Townsend and she has a reputation almost as bad as Clarisse’s. You really don’t want to meet her down a dark alley when she’s angry.”

Again the little voice in the back of my head warned me about her. I just cracked a smile and said, “My life is officially insane.”


	7. Dinner And A Prophecy

Here’s how my day went. I was praised for my clean up job from the night before but scolded for leaving the door open. Then I had breakfast with the Athena Cabin. After that came my first sword fighting lesson with the Ares Cabin…and my biggest but-whooping of all time courtesy of Karla. It was lunch time and I was just walking out of the infirmary after being knocked unconscious by said child of Ares.

Stiffly I made my way down to the beach where Percy, leader of the Poseidon cabin and apparently the most famous guy in the camp, was waiting to give us a lesson in sea monsters. That would be fun. Except for the fact that people kept looking at me weirdly and trying to forget what happened that morning at sunrise. In any case, the lesson had already started by the time I finally reached the beach.

“ You’re late, Lee.” Percy said when he noticed me.

“ Sorry.” I replied.

That’s when I noticed the giant sea monster looming up out of the water behind him. I mean, it was MASSIVE. I couldn’t understand how I didn’t notice it before. Its teeth were twice the size of me. And its red eyes were glaring at me as if trying to figure out how tasty I would be raw or if I needed to be roasted or seasoned. I guess the others were thinking the same thing because there was more than one kid who looked petrified. And they weren’t just newbies like John and me, either.

“ Yes, well. This is a very old sea serpent…” the son of Poseidon said.

“ And he looks like he hasn’t eaten in the past three centuries.” I mumbled gaining a couple of giggles.

He glared at me and I shut up and listened. Then came the practical part of the lesson…run away screaming while the sea serpent decided who to eat first. Of course, Percy wasn’t on the list. His father had probably promised the creature five massive sperm whales just for this one lesson. And the stupid wolf spirit inside of me stood its ground. Sometimes I wish that I was never cursed to a wolf spirit.

“ Lee! Get out of there!” Percy yelled. He was running too. Towards me and the sea serpent that was now looming above me.

Before I knew it, I had a crowbar in my hand. And the entire camp was now present and trying to work out how to save camp from the rabid sea monster. I don’t know what happened but my mind instantly went back in time to when I was a little kid holding a crowbar at an already torn pillow. I whacked the pillow three times like it was a piñata before an extremely loud, wounded bellow rang in my ears and brought me back to reality. I blinked a couple of times as I watched the sea serpent disappear back into the depths of its watery home, whimpering like a little kid who had just tripped and grazed its knee.

“ Okay…either that was one big baby of a sea serpent or I’ve lost it.” I grumbled.

“ You just beat a sea serpent with a crowbar.” Percy said, as if proving to himself the stunt I had just pulled was real. “ And I used a sword to wound mine.”

“ See. Crowbars do come in handy.”

That’s when I dropped to my knees in shock. My crowbar had returned to its cuff bracelet form and I added ‘getting attacked by monsters’ to my official mental list of what my curse means to me. I guess…no, I know…I will be very, very happy when I am no longer cursed. I never stopped to think that _Kleitos_ would forever get me acknowledged as the kid who fended off a sea serpent with only a magical bronze crowbar.

After a few minutes I decided that I needed to get off the beach. Somehow I managed to stand without any help and walk back up to the amphitheatre where the Athena cabin was to meet up with the Apollo and Hecate cabins for singing lessons. For some reason I was dreading that more than the sea serpent. I guess my wolf spirit was remembering what had happened there the night before. I couldn’t blame it. John’s brothers and sisters were probably still annoyed at me for ruining their campfire.

We sang and played music…or at least tried to, anyway. Don’t get me wrong, there were some good voices and music playing in the class. I just wasn’t one of them. I was never good in choir and John himself refused to give me a musical instrument. But I improvised. I turned out to be a good seat drummer and I actually managed to start a tune for once in my life. I have now found a new love for percussion instruments. You don’t do much except hit.

After that came free time. There was a choice between arts and craft, canoe racing and the climbing wall of death. Annabeth decided to take us to the climbing wall where the Hermes cabin was waiting to beat us up to the top along with Glade and a few of his satyr friends. That was all fine and good because while the rules were being revised and the stakes claimed, I was staring up at the wall and analysing every inch of it…right down to the lava and the safest stones.

“ Hey Lee!” Connor called as he and his brother walked up to me with that mischievous smile on their faces.

“ What?” I asked.

“ Can we have our camera back?” his brother, Travis, replied.

“ Sorry, gave it to Annabeth.”

“ Oh, man! Why’d you do that for? Now we’ll never get it back.”

“ She’s probably destroyed it by now.” Connor sighed.

From behind them, I noticed Annabeth smirk. “ Seriously? The only thing you would have seen was the inside of my mouth. And just so you know, I won’t be easily fooled by a fake spider like that.”

“ You knew it was us and yet you don’t even know us?”

“ You’re Travis and Connor Stoll, sons of Hermes, God of mischief. Plus I thought Annabeth was going to kill me when she screamed out your names. I don’t know who’s who, though.”

“ Well, in payback for the camera and the spider, first one to the top and back without getting hurt wins.” Travis said.

“ You’re on.”

With that, we started the climb. Travis and Conner were pretty fast, but so was I. I quickly learned why it was nicknamed the climbing wall of death when a folly of rocks decided that then was a great time to fall. And me with my wacked out mind instantly thought of a song so I began climbing the wall while singing my own version of ‘itsy bitsy spider’. It went something like this:

_‘Itsy Bitsy Demigod_

_Climbed up the lava wall._

_Down came the rocks,_

_To somehow make you fall._

_But dodge the rocks and lava,_

_As they hurry past._

_And the itsy bitsy demigod_

_Will reach the top at last.’_

Please don’t ask where it came from. I have no idea.

Regardless, Travis and Connor won leaving me with quite a few nasty bruises and one or two minor burns on my arms. Guess who went for their second visit to the infirmary that day. That’s right, me. One of these days I will learn to heal myself. Though it will probably never happen. I might be able to learn wound dressing techniques, though.

Anyway…after that painful experience, the horn for dinner was sounded. This confused the entire camp because there was still half an hour before the sun was due to set, which meant it was half an hour before dinner was supposed to start. It also got some of the other campers annoyed at not having been able to complete whatever they had been doing. I found out it was so that I could get a decent meal into my stomach before the game tonight without having to leave early.

That night I had five sausages, one jacket potato, one big scoop of peas and corn, hot chips, bacon rinds, three big red chillies...basically a super large, super spicy country breakfast with extra meat and some vegies to go with it. Regardless of what time of day it was, I usually got stuck into the meat. I blamed my curse. My dad thought otherwise.

I sacrificed two of my sausages and my potato to Athena and caught a whiff of baked mushrooms and spicy beef noodles as I returned to my proper table with the Athena cabin. And this time I didn’t feel awkward about it. What I felt awkward about was having the silver owl actually land on my shoulder and look down at my plate.

“ That’s a lot of meat, even for a guy.” One of my brothers, Malcolm, said, following the bird’s gaze.

“ I’ll pack it down.” I replied, matter-of-factly.

Sure enough, I did. Within ten minutes every scrap of meat was gone. Two nights of full meals was really starting to get on my stomach’s good books. My mind drifted to a time before I woke up at Camp Half-Blood when John and I would practically have to either beg for or steal small amounts of food that we could easily sneak away, and we weren’t the best thieves, and to a time where my dad and I would have to hunt at night just to get some meat into us.

By the time I realised that everyone had grown quiet, I had finished eating my chillies and was about to go onto my peas and corn. Annabeth was trying to get me to stop and look up, but it was Malcolm who ended up elbowing me in the ribs. Standing up at the big table was a girl with red hair. And what was even freakier was that she was looking right at me with glowing green eyes like she was about to accuse me of something that I hadn’t done.

I was scared. For her sanity and mine. And her voice practically turned my spine into a long pillar of ice:

_“ Four will travel on this quest of wills,_

_The white wolf's blood shall boil and spill._

_To love or hate is ones demand,_

_And bow down to that which is unplanned._

_A musician shall appear and guide them through the falls,_

_And tame the beast through the mother's calls._

_But there shall be no hope for the ray of the sun,_

_When the final battle of the cursed is won.”_

Then she collapsed. And the only thing I could think about was the white wolf. My thoughts were instantly on my father.


	8. Plans

Suddenly I felt like I was going to be sick. I was staring at my plate without seeing anything. I was hearing things going on around me without understanding anything. My body was cold and my mind had all but shut down. Something was going to happen to my dad.

If I was keeping track, I would say that that was the most time that I have not moved even an inch. And it was freaking the others out. Unlike most demigods, I was not dyslexic. That why I’ve been able to help John with his reading. But for a demigod with ADHD to sit literally frozen in place…people knew that something was wrong.

I could just feel someone fussing over me, trying to get me to eat and drink something, checking my wrist for a pulse and my forehead for a fever. But I wouldn’t do anything. The food would drop from my mouth and the drink would just run down my chin. I was still breathing, but that was only because of natural habit. All I could think about was that my dad had gotten himself into some form of trouble.

When Chiron said that Capture-the-Flag was starting as soon as the sun was down and he wanted us to get ready, I was practically a zombie. To the concern of everyone, I got up from my place at the table and walked out of the dining pavilion. I walked over to the Athena cabin and sat behind it; half waiting for the sun to set and bring out my wolf self, half still in that zombie like state.

As the sun disappeared below the horizon, my transformation began. I didn’t hear the others until after I was almost completely wolf. Nor did I feel the pain until I was almost completely wolf. I don’t even think I screamed once I was that out of it. Before I realised what was happening, I had raised my head and let loose a long howl, instantly breaking the trance that I was in as well as letting the rest of the camp know where I was.

“ It’s coming from behind the cabin!” I heard one of my younger half-sisters exclaim.

“ Lee, are you okay?” John asked as he and the others ran around to the back of the building.

That was when I discovered that my cuff bracelet was also a translation device.

 _Something’s going to happen to my dad._ I whimpered, my human voice sounding like it was coming from a bad radio channel out of my wrist.

“ You…You spoke.”

“ How’s that possible? Wolves don’t talk.” An Aphrodite kid said.

“ His mouth wasn’t even moving when he said it.” A Demeter girl observed.

“ He’s possessed!” the unmistakable voice of Connor screamed.

“ Connor, shut up!” Travis ordered.

“ What do you mean something’s going to happen to your dad?” Annabeth asked, getting over her shock easily enough.

I repeated the only line I remembered from the prophecy. _That second line,_ ‘The white wolf’s blood shall boil and spill _’, it scared me. My dad is mainly white. I mean, yes he has brown patches, but those aren’t…they shouldn’t affect things, right? And he…has a knack for getting into trouble because of what he is._ I replied, still trying to get over the fact that mum’s gift was also a translator.

“ I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

 _You don’t understand._ I thought to myself. _We’re more vulnerable in our wolf form._

Thankfully my _Kleitos_ translator did not relay my personal thoughts otherwise the entire camp would have known. And that would have given the Ares campers a plan to try and get at me. Quietly I listened as Annabeth explained that the Apollo, Poseidon, Hermes, Demeter, Iris, Hephaestus, Aphrodite, Hades, Hypnos and Tyche cabins were joining us in the game. This meant that Ares had everyone else behind them. And Ares was currently holding the title. Only Hera, Zeus and Artemis weren’t participating.

But I was formulating my own plans and back up plans in case something happened. Annabeth’s plan was to have the Iris kids play as flag defence, me as scout along with some Apollo and Hermes kids, the Hypnos kids on border patrol and everyone else on high alert as defence/offence throughout our side of the river while she and Percy go for the flag. Now don’t get me wrong, it was good. But mine was slightly different.

In my mind, I could see the battlefield. I could see the Apollo archers up in the trees. I could see the Iris kid, Butch, standing at the flag with one of the Hypnos kids. I could see Demeter kids around the border, making a sort of barrier of plants, with me and the other Hypnos kids. I would be acting as a scout as well and the archers would be on high alert from the trees, too. Nico Di Angelo of Hades would be leading Tyche, what remained of Iris and some of Hephaestus to the right of our flag. Leo Valdez of Hephaestus would be leading the rest of his cabin and some of Athena and Hermes to the left of our flag. To the front, the rest of Athena would join with the cabin of the love goddess while the rest of Hermes, Poseidon and three of Athena (including Annabeth) would go into enemy territory. And as prison guards I was going to place Drew from Aphrodite and someone from Hypnos.

If needed my backup plan included me being the one to sniff out the flag and capture it, Percy’s Cyclops brother guarding the flag with Nico, Percy and Annabeth flanking me with some Hermes and Hephaestus kids, everyone else in offence/defence positions and, once more, the Apollo archers in the trees. Both plans also included that if anyone was caught or in trouble, they would whistle and call for me to come get them out of there with someone from Hermes and if I was caught or in trouble and needed, then I would give a short howl.

“ Any questions?” Annabeth asked.

 _Yes._ I replied, breaking myself out of my trance. _Who’s guarding prison? And what if something happens to you and Percy while you’re in enemy grounds? Who’s going to back you up? We need to have every aspect covered or else we will fail._

“ Did you have anything else in mind?”

 _As a matter-of-fact, yes. Two plans actually._ From there, I proceeded to explain my plans to the rest of the blue team (Ares was red); making them as simple as possible without making it too hard so that the little kids would be able to understand. _And if at any time we feel the need to change, give me two short whistles and I’ll give a long howl._

“ Those are pretty good.” Percy and another of my half-brothers agreed.

“ He’s only forgetting that Ares, especially Karla, is out to kill him.” John argued.

“ I had Clarisse out to get me on my first game and we managed to win.” Percy said.

“ Only ‘cause I put you up as bait, Seaweed Brain.” Annabeth grumbled.

 _Yeah, well…I’m not putting myself up as bait._ I growled.

“ No. You’re just going to get caught and pulverised.” John replied sarcastically.

 _They’ll have to catch me first._ Okay, I swear that is slowly becoming my own personal catch-phrase.

To my surprise, Annabeth decided to go with my plans. Though she made some changes of her own to my main plan. Some of the waiting defence troops would also advance into enemy territory as a kind of distraction and try and confuse the others. And to be honest, I was ashamed of myself for missing a key fact like that.

We donned our armour and equipped ourselves with shields and weapons before heading out to the forest. As soon as we were in there, the Apollo cabin made their way into the branches of the trees, arrows notched in their bows. Annabeth and I went around the rest of our little army, sorting them out into sections from my first plan. Once that was done, I summoned _Kleitos_ in pole arm form and got some cautious comments when I took my place near the river with the pole arm comfortably in my mouth. Then the horn blew for the start of the battle and my plan was placed to the test.

Almost instantly, the Demeter kids put up the plant barrier. Vines acted like trip wire between trees. Tree roots also became trip hazards. In some places, the vines and bushes seemed to grow wild and prevent any kind of access for anyone not ready to crawl or not an animal. And the Hypnos kids with me were wide awake and ready to make the enemy fall asleep if needed. I even decided to make diversions to the left and right of the flag where the others were. And let me tell you, slashing the undergrowth and otherwise making it seem like there was treasure down the end of the fake path was actually fun. It took my mind off my father.

Things were going well. Monsters attacked and were fended off. The enemy tried barging through our defences but they only managed to get forced back much to their disgust. And there was no sign of Karla anywhere. I even relaxed a little bit and returned _Kleitos_ to its cuff bracelet form. And that was mistake number one.

Here’s a tip for you. _Never_ let your guard down. _Ever_. Especially when you’re in the middle of a life-replicating battle and on a one way trip to getting pummelled by your enemy. Again. It does nothing for you except sent you into a world of pain. I was just thankful that the rules clearly state ‘NO KILLING OR MAIMING’ or else I probably would have been dead.

The second I returned _Kleitos_ to my wrist, I was attacked by one of the monsters that had made its home in the forest. It was a cross between a wolf, a lion and a tiger but it had a temper to match that of a dragon’s. We fought. I won. Just. It ran away when I called _Kleitos_ back out and managed to stab it in the side. Panting, I stood up and return the pole arm back to my wrist just as I heard a whistle from the central group.

I dashed. The Aphrodite and Athena2 group was in trouble. That could have only meant that the flag had been reached. When I got there, I was right. Our guys were doing a good job of trying to get the flag back, but the Ares group that had the flag were doing a pretty good job too. And leading them was Karla. I had the element of surprise and I noticed the Apollo cabin leader signal me with one of his arrows. It was clear. Get the flag away from Karla.

As quietly as I could, I charged into the battle. I only gave out a short howl when I was practically on top of the enemy. There was still a fair bit of distance between us and the river, but I didn’t want to risk anything. Instantly Nico and half of his defensive team showed up to help and the Ares were overwhelmed. Karla, on the other hand, decided to just keep on charging through with our flag.

 _Not in this life!_ I growled when I realised that she was managing to get through. _Get them across the river! Now! I’ve got the flag!_

The others went to complete my orders. Meanwhile, I was having a stand-off with Karla. She tried stabbing at me with her sword, but I sidestepped and leapt at the flag, managing to knock it away from the girl. With lightning speed, I had the flag pole in my mouth and was running off back in the direction of the flag keepers. Mistake number two came in the form of one of our archers exclaiming excitedly when they noticed I had regained the flag. There goes our raining arrows surprise.

“ Archers in the trees!” I heard Karla scream out. “ They’ve got archers in the trees!”

At the same time, I heard the crash of something large coming towards us from the enemy lines and one long and two short whistles from the same direction. My only thought as the Cyclops came into sight, barrelling towards me, was that the others had been caught. And I was the one who could change things.

 _Cyclops dude, Tyson, follow me. Now._ I called to the Cyclops.

“ What puppy want?” He asked as he caught up to me.

_I want you to guard the flag._

“ But…”

_We’re changing to plan B._

“ What’s plan B?”

_You watch the flag and make sure no one takes it. Okay?_

“ Okay.”

_Good man._

When we reached the current flag keepers, I got Tyson to plant the flag back into the ground then got him to stand where Butch was standing. Then I let loose a long howl. Instantly I felt Nico’s presence as Butch and the Hypnos kid ran in opposite directions. Around me, the rest of our troops were changing their formations. But I couldn’t stay long. As fast as I could, I made my way back to the river where a small group of Hephaestus and Hermes kids were waiting, Connor and Travis with them. The only ones missing were Percy and Annabeth and they were currently in trouble.

 _Connor. Travis. You two are to find the others and get them out of there._ I growled as we rushed across the river.

“ Got it!” The Stoll brothers exclaimed.

_The rest of us, to the flag!_

The roar behind me made me cringe inwards, but it seemed to give me more energy and shoot me through the enemy lines. And yes, I was fast. The enemy never saw me coming. Unfortunately, they heard my back up as they crashed through behind me. Travis and Connor were long gone by now. I just hoped that they were able to find the others and get them out of prison without much trouble.

Then I saw it. A nice big yellow-ochre sheet right in front of me. My senses checked for danger and they were constantly on alert, but my speed never faltered. I grabbed the flag and was just turning around and getting ready to rush back to the river when guess who emerged from behind a clump of bushes. And she looked murderous. I guess having a wolf steal back its flag right from your hands was not what she had been expecting.

“ Where do you think you’re going with that, wolf-boy?!” Karla practically yelled.

 _Oh, just across the river._ I replied, though I probably should have just kept my mouth shut…uh, thoughts to myself.

“ Not on my watch.”

_Wasn’t knocking me unconscious this morning enough?_

For an answer, she charged at me. _I’ll take that as a no._ I thought to myself as I leapt to the side and hurried out of there. And this is where John would have said that the Ares cabin should be pulverizing me. So far, I was proving him wrong. Of course, I did have to get tripped up mere centimetres from the river. Karla had a lasso around my hind leg. Not good.

“ Didn’t you hear me, wolf-boy? I said you weren’t going to the river!” she growled.

 _And I said I was._ I replied. Then a thought came to me. Maybe Karla was to be part of this quest of mine. The thought nearly gave me a heart attack. _I’ll make a deal with you. You let me go and I’ll let you come on the quest with me. How’s that sound?_

“ No deal! I’m not letting you go!”

 _So you like the idea of going on the quest with me._ I was playing my surprise, but inside I was genuinely shocked.

“ No! I would never go anywhere with you!” She almost wheeled back in fright.

_But think about it. With your insatiable thirst for blood and my brains of getting out of…getting to a certain goal in as whole a piece as you can get as a demigod. We’d be able to stay alive longer and be able to kick some monster butt another day. You don’t want to be stuck in a training camp all your life and not fight, do you?_

“ Shut your trap!”

_Nice to know you’re thinking about it. Maybe sleep over it and tell me what you think in the morning._

“ I’ll tell you what I think you should be doing. I think you should be returning my flag to me.”

_Ah, now why would I do that?_

“ Because I would bash your skull in if you don’t!”

_Now that would be pretty painful._

“ That’s what I’m talking about!”

_Really? Well, nice talking to you, but I’ve got to dash. Hope you’ll think about what I said. I was being serious about it._

With that, I placed a gamble and let go of the red flag pole. Then I bit through the rope around my leg and dashed across the river, picking up the flag pole as I did so. Behind me, Karla practically roared her anger, hate and frustration at me. And to be honest, it only made me run faster. When I got to the other side, I was greeted by a massive cheer from the trees and border. I dropped the red flag and raised my head howling until I ran out of breath and then starting all over again. In the distance I heard the horn blow, signalling the end of the game. We had won. And it was all because of me.

The others swarmed around me like bees protecting their hive. But I wasn’t focussing on them. I could see Karla in the distance seriously looking like a lost puppy and the nagging feeling in my gut from this morning was back. I guess Karla really was thinking about what I had said. But as I watched, she sneered at me and turned away. Maybe, just maybe, there was something she was hiding from the entire camp. That night I went to sleep thinking about what the prophecy meant and about Karla’s reactions.


	9. Keeping Enemies Closer

“ It’s been nearly two days since you won us the game. And not once has there been a fight between you and Karla. Are you sure nothing’s going on?” John asked as we walked away from the archery range together.

Both of our cabins had just had a combined lesson and we were heading to the Apollo cabin so that he could get my favourite basketball; the one that I had aimed at Lamia’s head. It was free time now, so we were going to spend it on the basketball courts and catch up on that game that he owed me about a week ago now thanks to the arrival of our favourite children eating, demonic snake woman. Please note the sarcasm.

“ For the last time, nothing is going on between us! She hates me! I have no idea what’s going on inside of me! End of story! Are you sure that you’re not turning into an Aphrodite boy?” I growled in exasperation.

“ So you admit?”

“ In your dreams! Give me that! First one to score twenty hoops wins.”

“ You’re on.”

Though he said it with a mischievous grin that clearly said that he would win. He threw me the basketball, which I caught on my chest and knocked the wind out of me slightly, before rushing off to the basketball court. You know, this camp would seem normal what with the beach, the basket and volley ball courts, the cabins, the canoe lake, the stables, the arts and craft area and, yes, even the climbing wall. But only if you somehow managed to overlook the striking of metal against metal from the arena and the forges, the buzzing sound of arrows zipping through the air and landing on the targets, trees, ground or anything that just so happened to be in the way by accident, the growling coming from the forest, the fact that there was lava on the climbing wall, and we can’t forget Mrs O’Leary the friendly monster dog bounding around the place or the flying horses.

We had promised Glade, when we first met him, that we’d show him what a game of basketball was and let him shoot some hoops, but it wasn’t until now that he actually got to find out. It was kind of sad, really, considering there was a basketball court here that he could have tried out on. But, then again, we had no idea exactly how long he had been away from camp for. So the satyr was waiting excitedly for us on the bench by the court, happily munching away on an aluminium can like it was popcorn. Note to self – find out what normal style foods the satyr likes so that you don’t always see him eating metal.

“ So, Glade? Up for some hoops?” I asked, sitting down next to him and swapping his half eaten can for the basketball.

“ Can I finish eating, first?” Glade asked, trying to swap the basketball back.

“ No can do. You’ve got enough iron in your diet already. Go on, John’s waiting for you.”

I managed to get him up off the bench and out to where John was waiting. We had decided, during archery, to let Glade shoot some hoops before we started our match that way it was done and we didn’t have to worry about it. And Glade had told us that he wasn’t going to give up on basketball unless he was able to score five times in a row, so I got comfortable figuring that this was going to take a while. The next thing I knew was that I was halfway to the moon and back when a gruff voice called out to me. I turned around to see none other than my arch enemy, Karla Townsend.

“ Hey, wolf-boy! I’ve got a bone to pick with you.” She growled, marching across the commons area.

My life was officially over. “ Okay, then. Fire away.” I said, getting the feeling that she just wanted to talk and not pummel me into the ground.

“ What in Hades did you mean back at the river on Friday night?!”

“ I meant exactly what I said. You’re tough and fearless and bloodthirsty. And you don’t take no for an answer. That’s pretty impressive and if a quest to break my curse means that one day I’ll make some stupid mistake and meet up with some monster that wants to stop me from breaking that curse, then I’m going to need someone to snap me out of myself. I can’t think of a better way than a nice threat to smash my head in if I did do something like that. In other words, we could use you.”

“ That better not mean what I think it means.”

“ No! Gods, no! I mean, your strong will may probably be the only thing that keeps us going.” I said hastily before muttering under my breath. “ Besides, there’s a saying ‘ Keep your friends close but your enemies closer’.” 

Thankfully, she didn’t hear that last part otherwise I was sure she was going to deck me. I even dared to look at her straight in the eye (usually a fatal mistake if you don’t want to become as flat as a pancake). And what I saw was the same lost puppy look from Capture-the-Flag, only this time it wasn’t visible on the outside.

I had to look away. My insides were burning and itching. And that damned voice in the back of my head was threatening me again. I seriously wanted to strangle myself just to shut it up. But even though my hands balled into fists, my arms wouldn’t move. I even watched Glade get his first goal and then start doing a little dance because he finally got it in. But it was Karla who snapped me out of it and made me jump again.

“ What’s got you tense?” it was a growl, but it was softer than normal.

“ Nothing. Nothing at all.” I replied faintly before deciding to change subjects. “ So have you finally thought about what I said?”

“ I have thought about how insane you are, yes.”

“ Trust me, we all think I’m insane. I meant about the quest. You want to come along and make sure that I’m not stupid in anything that I do?”

“ Why are you even asking me? I should just punch you right here and get it over with!”

“ You were actually…?”

“ Hey! Lee! Get your butt over here! Glade’s scored his five in a row! Or did you want to stay there with your…?” John called over with a nasty smile on his face that really didn’t suit him.

“ I wouldn’t finish that sentence if I were you, Smith!” Karla ordered.

At the same time, I finished it for him. “ She is not my girlfriend!”

I don’t know which one of us was brighter; me or Karla. Nor do I know if it was out of anger, embarrassment, annoyance or a combination of any or all three. In any case, John and Glade were shell-shocked. I didn’t realise that Karla had balled her fist until it was too late. The next thing I knew was that my vision was going blurry and darkening.

I came too with John shaking my shoulders and slapping my cheek a few seconds later. The side of my head ached so I figured that Karla had punched me there. Oddly I wondered how many brain cells had been killed and then wondered why I was even wondering about that. Slowly I got up and looked behind me to where Karla was disappearing down towards the canoe lake. My one chance at getting her to join was probably gone.

“ She said something about wanting you to stay in the pavilion after dinner.” Glade said, realising who I was looking at.

“ I’ll be transforming half way through dinner. Does she expect me to purposefully make everyone else lose their appetites?” I replied.

“ Maybe go back to the pavilion when you’re done.”

“ Right. Well, it’s been nice knowing you guys. If I don’t make it through tonight, I just want you to know that you two have been the best friends a guy can have. If I do miraculously make it through the night, I would be honoured to have you two join me on the quest.”

“ You’ll make it through. You managed to outrun Ares before. I know you can do it again. And I’ll never leave you to face monsters on your own. Right Glade?” John said.

“ Uh…yeah. What he said.” The satyr replied nervously before leaning closer to my ear. “ Just in case, did you want me to put a wolf on your shroud as well as an owl?”

“ Glade!” John and I screamed at him.

* * *

Dinner went smoothly enough. The whole time I was there, I was getting weird looks (again) and the Aphrodite girls were whispering and giggling in their annoying way. Most of the Ares kids were glaring at me and looking like they wanted to pulverize me, especially Karla’s twin brother Emmett. The only exception being Karla who was more intent on her dinner and what she could be wanting to tell me afterwards.

John kept glancing over to me and giving me two thumbs up to try and vaporize my nerves. And the Athena kids were sticking by me, no matter what the cost. In fact, they were glaring back at the Ares campers. Glade had also been at dinner, but he was talking with Annabeth over what my shroud should look like. Thankfully, John had walked up to the satyr and dragged him away before I left to turn into a wolf.

Mr D, the camp director, seemed oblivious to what was going on around him. But Chiron was looking around nervously as if he could sense the impending doom. And his not-so-comforting gaze kept landing on me like he was trying to tell me to be good and not die before the quest. So it was basically your typical camp dinner.

I was very thankful when my transformation began and I had to leave. Though I could feel everyone’s eyes on me…again. Even Karla had finally decided to look up and glare at me. But I got the feeling that she couldn’t believe that I was walking out on our unexpected meeting before she remembered what time it was and what usually happens to me when the sun finally disappears below the horizon.

Once the transformation was over and I was able to walk again, I slugged back to the dinning pavilion wondering what kind of torture Karla was going to put me in. Dinner was now over so I was getting more threats and embarrassing statements from the campers than encouragement statements (those mainly came from John and the Athena cabin). When I got there, Karla was calmly sharpening her dagger. I instantly wanted to run.

“ I thought you weren’t going to show up, wolf-boy.” She said, not looking up from her work.

 _Well I would have thought you would have spoken to me in private instead of where John and Glade and the rest of the camp could see us. Or do you seriously want the Aphrodite Cabin thinking that we’re a piece?_ I retaliated through my translator.

“ That’s not funny!”

_I never said it was. Now why are we having a private meeting in the pavilion after dinner when we could be getting ready for the sing-a-long?_

“ For the same reason why I was trying to talk to you earlier, dim-wit.”

 _Hey! I take offense of that! My mother is the Goddess of_ Wisdom _._ I said with a growl.

“ Oh, keep your tail on.” Now satisfied with how sharp her dagger was, she returned it to its scabbard on her leg. “ You have four places in this quest of yours. You’ll take one and if I know you, you’ll take you little pals. That leaves one place left.”

_I’m surprised you know how to count._

If you’re wondering, I’m not trying to get myself killed. I’m just really annoyed at missing the campfire. And John said something about me wanting to leave on the quest tomorrow morning for some strange reason, so I want to get some sleep for that as well as getting payback to the Stolls for a prank they pulled on me yesterday.

“ Don’t play smart with me Wolf!” Karla growled, whipping out her dagger and stabbing it into the table faster than normal, making me cringe.

Thankfully she seemed to calm down a little bit…after about five good minutes of intense glares aimed in my direction. Grumbling to herself, she prized her dagger from the table and began sharpening it again to get it back to how she liked it. I silently watched, not daring to speak in case she decided to stab the dagger into me next. After another minute, she returned the dagger to its scabbard. But by then, I already knew of how I was going to get back at the Stolls. I just needed Karla’s co-operation.

“ As I was saying, you have one more place left before you start your quest. And you chose me. Of all the people in camp, why choose me?” Karla continued as if nothing had happened.

 _I don’t really know._ I admitted. _It just seems like you should be on the quest. I don’t understand it. Maybe I really am going insane._

“ Well…I have been thinking about what you said. And I may as well join you.”

 _You’ve never been out of this camp, have you?_ I guessed. I seriously have to remind myself to keep my mouth shut.

“ Shut your godsforsaken trap! For your information, I have a score to settle with…someone. And it seems like joining you on this quest is the only way that I’m going to get that satisfaction! Now you better accept or I swear that you will not live through the night.”

_No. No objections. Your insatiable thirst for blood is exactly what I’m looking for. Welcome to the team. We’ll leave in the morning. But first, can you help me with something?_

“ What?” Karla asked suspiciously.

_I need to get back at the Stoll Brothers…_


	10. The Not-So-Fantastic Four

After much begging, whimpering and pain as Karla kicked, punched and stabbed at me, she finally agreed to helping me. The reason for all this was because I needed to either bite or scratch her before she went into the amphitheatre and scare Travis and Connor into thinking that my curse was contagious. Of course, I had to swear on the river Styx that it wasn’t and pray that the Ares Cabin would contain their anger at me long enough to realise that it was payback and not real.

Now you’re probably wondering why I’m doing this. Well, let me start by explaining that there is a temporary kennel next to the Athena Cabin. It was built to look like an Ancient Greek temple with pillars all around and everything. At the front was a typical kennel arch and only two pillars; one for each side of the arch. And sitting on the roof was a silver owl. There was even a soft pillow/blanket lining the floor of the ‘temple’. The project was really quiet awesome and with everyone working on making it for me, it just made it better.

Somehow, the night before last, the Stoll brothers managed to steal my pillow/blanket and cover it completely with itching powder. That’s not the worst of it. While I was asleep, they managed to snap a metal collar around my neck and somehow merge the chain to the kennel so that there really was no way to get it off by hand. They also painted my kennel…pink! Of all things! But they went too far when they painted the owl sea green with a blue glowing trident on its chest. I found out about all of this as the sun was rising and I was forced back into my human form, wearing a dog collar and chained to my own bed. I was not pleased.

And that was why I was begging Karla to help me with this. Because the entire camp practically knew about our little meeting. And, really, it was the only way I was going to pull this off. The hard part was getting Karla to co-operate with me. I was just thankful that her pulverizing me and not knocking me unconscious actually helped make this seem real.

 _Again I’m sorry for dragging you into this and I promise that nothing will happen to you. The curse can_ only _be claimed by those of my ancestor’s blood._ I whimpered.

“ Stop that right now. I’ve already agreed to it. I would actually enjoy seeing this.” Karla snapped at me, kicking me in the ribs in order to get me off my stomach.

_Do you give me permission to bite or scratch you?_

“ Scratch. I do not want your wolf slobber over me.”

So I obliged. And I’ll tell you, I hated every second of it. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I actually felt guilty at injuring Karla. But I dare say Karla played her part well. As I dragged my claws down her arm, her scream rang in my ears. Hot blood clung to my paw like glue. The scent of blood tingled at my nose. And something stirred within me. Something that I didn’t trust. I hurried away from Karla and she moved towards the amphitheatre.

I gave her some time to get there and relay her warning to Connor and Travis. While I waited I fought with the inner wolf inside me. That’s what I was feeling. The wolf’s instincts to hunt the wounded. But I overcame the feeling by shaking myself and trying to make myself look terrorising and were-wolfish. And let me tell you, I felt stupid. Finally I moved, snarling and snapping my teeth like a rabid animal.

When I got to the amphitheatre, I found that the place was in a state not far from panic. Karla was supposedly unconscious from my curse taking control of her body. Occasionally she would shudder, but that was all. Emmett looked murderous. The Apollo kids didn’t know what to do. There were campers with weapons out, waiting for me to show myself. And Connor and Travis looked very scared indeed. Perfect.

I lurked in the shadows, snarling for extra effect, before I finally stepped out directly above the Hermes bench and howled. That was when panic sunk in. Everyone tried to protect Connor and Travis…or just pummel me into the ground for what I did to Karla. And the fact that my beating at the hands of said daughter of Ares making me look even more terrifying only seemed to ripen the effects.

With a snarl, I leapt into the mass of demigods and made my way to where the Stoll brothers were. Of course, I had to dodge weapons galore as I did so. But it was worth it. Finally I managed to reach my targets and bit into Travis’s arm. That’s when Clarisse’s spear (I have no idea where she hid that thing!) tried to stab at me. What made it worse was that it actually got me and sent a wave of electricity through me as I yelped with the pain.

Thankfully I had let go of Travis first. And while I was being electrocuted, I managed to scratch Connor’s shoulder. Operation: Get Back At Travis And Connor Stoll was a success. But it came with a price. I collapsed to the ground, twitching and trying to breathe. I couldn’t tell if Connor and Travis were scared out of their lives that I had attacked them or if they were frightened for what Clarisse had done to me. But what surprised me most was Karla. She had opened her eyes just in time to see me twitching on the floor.

“ No! Stop! Don’t kill him!” She ordered, rushing over to me and tearing Clarisse’s spear from my shoulder.

“ Why shouldn’t I? He hurt you!” the Ares cabin leader growled back.

“ I hurt him far worse than he hurt me!” I couldn’t argue there.

“ What is going on?” Chiron asked. I could hear his hooves making their way towards me.

“ It was payback.” Karla explained.

This caused an Aphrodite girl to ask, “ So there’s something going on between you two, is there Karla?”

“ No! And I will make the next person to even think that take the slow train down to meet Hades himself!”

Sheesh, Karla. They’re probably all thinking about it right now.

I didn’t say it out loud, but I think I might have given her a telepathic message because the next thing I knew was that her foot was colliding with my chest. The pain forced out a yelping whine and caused my vision to waver. I was almost certain that I now had at the very least one broken rib. Chiron stamped his foot like he was irritated by something.

“ Karla! Would you like to explain why this was payback?” he asked, his voice also irritated.

 _Pranked._ It was the only thing I managed to say before I blacked out.

* * *

When I finally woke, I found myself still in the amphitheatre. John was kneeling next to me with his hand gently on the back of my neck close to my shoulder. He was talking about some book that I had him read in case of an emergency and ordered someone to get some nectar for me. I never realised that he had actually memorised what I had made him read. Then again he probably had no choice seeing as I would not let him leave it for very long.

I was still out of it, though, when I felt the godly liquid drip onto my tongue. And I was thankful for it. When I finally managed to gain enough strength to look around, I found Karla having a heated discussion with Emmett and Clarisse. And the Stolls were sitting on the nearest bench looking like they wanted to laugh, but were trying to be serious. I guess they must have realised that I would get them back somehow.

“ That was a pretty cool trick you pulled, Lee. How’d you con Karla into doing it?” Travis asked when he saw me looking at him.

“ Well, it was cool up until the time where you stopped breathing.” Connor corrected.

 _I did what now?_ I asked, looking at John.

“ Yeah. You stopped breathing not long after Clarisse got you with her spear.” He replied.

_Oh. Well, I’m ready to go on a quest if you three are?_

“ You just went into respiratory arrest and you already want to go on a quest?!”

_Why not?_

“ You’re insane!”

_I’m not sure why that’s surprising you considering…_

“ Considering what?”

_You’ll find out tomorrow morning at that big tree. In the meantime, I’ll need help packing my sack and I’ll need some rest._

“ What? Already?”

_See you bright and early. Grab some breakfast first though. Wouldn’t want to trek all the way to my dad’s on an empty stomach._

“ We’re going to your dad’s? But I thought you hated him!”

 _The last intelligent words my grandfather ever told me were_ ‘Believe in your father. He may be rash and forgetful, but he once knew everything there is to know about our history and what you must do.’ _When I asked him what he meant, he proceeded to walk around the room like a chicken while braying like a donkey with every step. And this was all when I was nearly three. I was scared._

“ You’re grandfather walked around like a chicken?” Connor asked. I sighed, knowing exactly where this was going.

“ And brayed like a donkey?” Travis added, trying to hide a giggle.

 _My grandfather was insane. He was in an asylum. He even attempted to kill himself on more than one occasion. He finally succeeded exactly a week after he said that to me._ I growled, instantly silencing any fits of laughter that was sure to burst out of the brothers.

With that, I got up and left the amphitheatre. I didn’t want to dwell on the thought. Malcolm went with me to help make sure that I had everything I needed in my sack. But before I left, I noticed the soft glint in Karla’s eyes. She must have realised because it was gone in a flash. There was seriously something going on with her. And it was freaking me out.

In the Athena cabin, Malcolm took my gym sack from under a desk near the back wall and brought it over to his bed. It hadn’t been touched since I woke up at camp (I hadn’t seen much use in opening it at all), but it looked like it had been opened since the day we arrived. Curious, I tried opening the sack. That didn’t do much, so Malcolm ended up opening it for me. What I found was my books (one on animal health and what to do in an emergency, five on mythology, three on architecture, three on battle techniques and two 320page exercise books full of maps and plans), three shirts, one pair of jeans, my Rubik’s cube, three bottles of water, some lolly rappers, two apples, an orange and a bag of probably stale corn chips.

But there was also a snake-skin pouch. I knew exactly what it was the second I saw it. It was my spoils of war from when I defeated Lamia. And it was stuffed with gold drachmas. Either John or Glade must have put it in there while I was unconscious in the infirmary. But I never wanted to touch it in case it was some kind of calling device that Lamia would answer and show up at the camp entrance.

“ Where’d you get that?” Malcolm asked.

 _I gift from Lamia. She was kind enough to leave it lying around when she disintegrated. I thought I gave it to Glade. Guess he didn’t want it._ I replied, picking up the lolly rappers and corn chips and putting them in the bin.

“ You fought…”

_The demonic, child eating snake woman? Yeah._

“ And you lived?”

_I’m here now, aren’t I?_

“ True. But how did you do it?”

_With a crazy satyr, a really long branch and a basketball. Maybe after I survive this quest, I’ll tell you the story._

“ I hold you to your promise. Wait here and I’ll go and see if the Hermes kids can’t get you some more food.”

Like that, he was gone. While he was gone, the rest of the cabin showed up and got ready for bed. They looked concerned for my health, but I reassured them that I was going to be fine. Of course, Annabeth wasn’t nearly as fooled as the others. Though maybe Percy had something to do with that.

Nearly half an hour had passed when Malcolm returned stifling a laugh and carrying a small box in his hands. Apparently the Stolls were still thinking about my prank and were wondering if they were going to turn into werewolves. It made me want to further the prank a little, but I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it. In any case, the box contained some small tins of corn kernels, some bread and some packages of meat. There was also a packet of biscuits, some carrots, a couple of bags of lollies, a canteen of Nectar and a small pouch of Ambrosia, both with warning labels, and a small pouch of 'mortal' money.

With help, I managed to get everything into the sack and draw it closed. Then, wishing the others good night, I dragged my heavy bag outside and into my once more white kennel so that I could make sure that nothing was stolen from it. But I couldn’t sleep even though I knew I needed it. I was too busy worrying about the quest and about Karla’s reaction when she saw me in the amphitheatre.

By the time morning came around, I had already done a quick check on John and Karla to make sure they were ready. Deciding they were I dragged my sack to the pavilion for an early breakfast and waited for the sun to wake. It had now become a habit that I transform in the pavilion in the morning and near the cabins in the evening so that I didn’t disturb anyone. I was half way through my transformation when Karla showed up for breakfast.

“ That is really disgusting.” She commented quietly.

I couldn’t reply due to the amount of pain I was in. But the strange thing was, seconds after she made that comment, she sat down to a plate of bacon and eggs that a naiad had brought her and began eating (after she sacrificed to her dad, of course). And, today, she really looked like one of those street gang members complete with the sneer.

Once I had stopped transforming and shakily taken a seat at the Athena table about to eat some bacon and eggs myself after my sacrifice, Glade and John walked in. I swear they nearly had heart failure when they saw Karla eating breakfast. I smiled weakly at them and motioned them for breakfast. They obliged, cautious of the daughter of Ares. It was the first time that I had ever seen Glade eat strawberry jam on raisin toast. Pretty soon, with Karla being the first to leave, we were all fed and making our way to the big tree on the hill.

“ Explain one thing to me, Lee.” John asked in a whisper, walking beside me. “ Why did you choose her of all people?”

“ Because, John. We may need her.” I replied.

“ Just like the crowbar thing?”

“ Just like the crowbar thing. Besides, I needed to fill the fourth space. And to be honest, she was the only person I thought fit for the job.”

“ You do realise that this is kind of like the Fantastic Four, right?”

To be honest, I never thought about it. Looking back on it, I realised that we were…kind of. Okay, so the only similarity we possessed was that there was one girl and three guys. In place of the Invisible Woman, we had a highly aggressive and slightly bloodthirsty daughter of the war god. In place of the Thing, we had a crazy goat-man with an iron deficiency and height problem. In place of Mr Fantastic, we had a seemingly insane super-genius kid that turns into a wolf at night. And in place of the Human Torch, we had a jock star in the making that just so happened to get his good looks from his father, the sun god. And the only attention we were bound to attract was of the bloodthirsty monster kind.

We were three kids and a myth man practically going on a suicide mission! Not to mention the guys were afraid that the girl would turn on them at any given moment and pummel them to near death, and that the leader had really only just realised that he was developing a crush for said girl. I told you I was insane. But as I walked past the border, I got a strange feeling in my gut that when I came back from this quest, I would be staying for a very long time.


	11. To The Wolf's Den

As soon as we passed the border I realised that we were in trouble. We had no way of getting to my dad’s place. We hadn’t even asked for help getting into the city. And the others were looking at me and expecting to do something. This was embarrassing. With a heavy sigh, I hefted my sack better over my shoulder and began walking down the road. It was going to be a long and uncomfortable walk.

Thankfully the others remained quiet…that is, until we ended up in Southold and found ourselves getting tired. Before we got into the heavily populated areas, we made sure that Glade had his disguise on. We didn’t want people freaking out at the sight of a goat-man so we gave him a pair of jeans that, once again, were stolen by the Stolls as well as a pair of boots that we taped to his legs (John had some duct tape in his sack along with other things that I couldn’t fit in mine). He carried his club on his back and was using the old crowbar as a kind of walking stick. I knew we would need it one of these days.

John seriously didn’t look happy. He had his bow on his back with his quiver and a dagger at his side. But compared to Karla, he was pretty calm. Karla, on the other hand, looked about ready to ring my neck. As soon as we got to the nearest bench, she sat down and refused to move. Of course she had to move her sword from her belt so that she could sit down. But that just escalated my fear of her killing me.

“ Why did you not think about transportation?” She asked with a growl in her voice.

“ Because my father’s place can’t be reached through transportation.” I replied, avoiding her gaze.

“ And where exactly is your father’s place?” John asked.

That was the one other thing I did not tell John about my life. Ever since I began to transform, my father has slowly been growing more paranoid by the day. He was afraid that I would give away the family secret. But then he started to get angry with me for that very reason. He started going overboard. When I was seven, he started doing things that he regretted later on and not just to me. And then, more when he was a wolf, he would forget he was ever human. I was the one who had to remind him.

“ Lee?” John called, snapping me back into the present.

“ What?” I asked, not realising I had spaced out.

“ I asked if you knew where your father’s place was.”

“ Oh, I know, all right. It’s the one place that I would never be able to forget.”

Before anyone could stop me, I had _Kleitos_ in my hand as a crowbar and was running down the street. I don’t know what came over me, but before I had even rounded the next corner I was being tackled to the ground. When my vision focussed, I found myself on my back and looking up at Glade. Behind him stood Karla and John looking confused, alarmed and concerned. Wow. I never thought I’d see that look on Karla’s face.

“ You need to take a chill pill, man. There’s no need to go on a rampage when we’re this close to camp. We thought you had seen a monster.” Glade said, slapping my face hard to make sure that I was myself.

“ Get off me. I need to find our ride.” I growled, pushing the satyr off me.

I forced myself to my feet and wiped the back of my hand across my mouth. When I pulled my hand away, I found blood. My gums must have been cut open when I had that unexpected meeting with the ground. But the sight of my three toned blood nearly made me gag. The only thing it didn’t explain was why my head was tingling.

But I ignored it and walked away from my quest-mates despite their concerned looks. I stopped in front of the third building from the corner and, without looking behind me, easily managed to flag down a passing vehicle. To my luck, it was another taxi. Great. The last time I stole a taxi, I ended up knocking myself unconscious on the steering wheel before managing to drive it into the large copper dragon that was right in the taxi’s path. I could only imagine what I would do to this taxi. In fact I almost felt sorry for it. But necessity calls.

“ Where too, kid?” The guy asked once he had wound down the window.

“ My dad’s place.” I replied.

“ And where is that? I’m not a mind-reader, you know.”

“ You don’t have to be. Just get out of the car and give me your phone. Keep the keys in the ignition and the car running. And turn off the company tracking device thing you have in there.”

“ Now wait just a minute…”

He didn’t get to finish his sentence because I had called on _Kleitos_ ’s crowbar form and pointed it at the guy. I knew that he wouldn’t have seen the sword form even if I wanted him to, so I threatened him with crowbar form instead. It seemed to have the same effect, though. Either that or it was the steel look that I knew was in my eyes and the threatening stance I was holding that made him stop.

“ Look here, Kid. You don’t want to get into something like this.” The guy said, regaining himself.

“ Just do what I say and you won’t get hurt.” I replied, threateningly.

To be honest, the guy didn’t have a choice. It was then that I realised that I was slowly being forced into my wolf form. And that was not good. But it seemed to be working because the guy fiddled with something on the dashboard before taking his mobile phone in hand and stepping out of the car. I held my hand out for the phone, still threatening him with _Kleitos_ , and he obliged. Then I swung the crowbar and hit him in the side of the head. He went down like a rock and I prayed that he forgot what had just happened when he woke up.

“ What did you just do, Lee! Even I’m not that mad to go knocking people out cold!” Karla practically screamed at me.

“ Just hurry up and get in the taxi.” I growled in reply, already sliding into the driver’s seat.

“ No way, man. The last time you stole a taxi, you nearly killed us.” John grumbled.

“ Just get in the car.” I repeated.

Reluctantly, the others did so and once they had their seatbelts on, I floored it. This time I didn’t care if we were going to get caught by the cops. I knew that I would be able to out-smart them. I was willing to take this thing to the dirt tracks if I really had to. I was willing to do anything to end this curse that had plagued my family for generations.

Thankfully, no one came after me. If they had, they would have been sorry. Fortunately the cab driver had just filled the tank. Hopefully it didn’t run out or die before I got to my dad’s place. Unfortunately I was scaring my friends in the back seat. Even Glade had gotten over his fear of sitting next to Karla. Apparently I was scarier that she was at the moment.

The thing was, because we had spent quite a few precious hours just walking to Southold, we had lost a good part of the sunlight. And there were two reasons why I was hurrying. The first reason was more hazardous being I wanted to be off the road before the sun went down and I was forced to transform. It would be suicide to drive as a wolf. And the second reason was because I wanted to get to my father’s place before he went into the forest. I say this because if he went into the forest, I wouldn’t be able to find him until tomorrow.

I didn’t think things would be able to get worse until I looked in the rear-view mirror and saw not one but two giant black dogs. And these dogs weren’t of the friendly Newfoundland variety. They were more of the gargantuan Old English sheepdog variety, only jet black and with glowing red eyes. Did I mention that they looked like they were very, very hungry? Well, they were. I didn’t think the car could go any faster, but it managed.

“ Lee! Slow down!” John yelled from behind me.

“ There are hellhounds after us.” I managed to choke back.

“ If you don’t slow down, the cops are bound to catch you once we get into the city!”

“ So you want to die in the jaws of a couple of gargantuan dogs the size of houses? You’re nothing but an after dinner mint to them!” I finally yelled.

“ Then we stand and fight!” Karla growled.

“ Are you Gods damned serious?” John growled back at her.

“ I am plenty serious, Smith!”

“ My name is John! Start using it!”

“ Like I care! Lee! Turn this thing around now!”

“ I may be insane, but I’m not that insane!” I yelled, keeping my eyes forward.

The yelling went like that for a good twenty minutes. Glade was the only one who kept quiet. I actually wondered if he was okay back there. It turned out he was too petrified to speak. By the time we had finished the argument we had already reached the big city and were screaming down the roads trying to get out of there. The cops came after us, but I’m pretty sure those dogs would have done something about them easily enough. We were their play toy, after all. And nothing got in the way of a dog and its play toy.

Okay, so what really happened about the cops was that I ended up driving into a parking lot in order to try and lose them and I ended up flying off the top of the parking lot and into a side street a couple of buildings away. I’m not sure what happened when they saw me do that because I was too busy almost being strangled by my passengers to even understand what was going on. All I knew was that those hellhounds seemed to be having the times of their lives chasing us. They had jumped too.

We had managed to get out of the city by about three in the afternoon. And to top our day off, the car decided it was going to overheat. Great! Smoke was coming out of the bonnet and that was when I knew that we had to high-tail it out of there despite the gargantuan dogs running behind us in the hopes of their next meal. I pulled over, absentmindedly picked up the cab driver’s phone and kicked the door open. John and Karla did the same with John dragging our still petrified satyr along with him.

I turned away from the taxi and, hoisting my sack over my shoulder better, walked into the nearby trees. There would be no way to get to my dad’s tonight. Karla was going to get her wish after all. I could feel those hellhounds closing in on us. Just to be safe, I called on _Kleitos_ ’s sword form and prepared to be jumped by the massive black dogs. The only thing I was thankful for, though, was that there was no snake woman as of yet.


	12. When I Get There

Now I could have been wrong. There could have been snake women somewhere close behind the hellhounds. But I didn’t want to think about that otherwise I would have known I was being stalked by them. Just in case, I prepared myself for any more unwanted visitors. What I didn’t expect was to get a phone call from an angry centaur while I was in the middle of a battle. And trust me; you did not want to have a centaur as your enemy.

But before we get to that, I’ve got to go back to how it all started…

Karla and John decided that it was better if they followed me away from the taxi before anyone noticed the overheated, stolen vehicle. Glade was still being dragged along by John. I think I permanently managed to scare him out of his wits by that last stunt. Oh well, he’ll live. Though, John did throw him on the ground when they got under the cover of the trees.

In any case, the second that the three of them were with me, I got the really bad feeling that we were being watched. I knew from the way that Karla and John both tensed that they felt it too. I also had a feeling I knew who was watching us. I just hoped I was wrong. But, as per usual, my luck was elsewhere. Probably in the same place as it always was…on a sunny, golden beach somewhere on the other side of the world.

You heard them before you saw them, though I think it should have been the other way around considering their size. They sounded like a pair of army jets flying really low, right above your head. To Karla and John it was probably loud. But to my ears it was like torture. I was actually tempted to throw my hands over my ears and cower in the nearest tree hollow. But I kept a firm grip on _Kleitos_ and waited for the hellhounds to appear.

A few seconds later, the twin towering dogs from hell arrived. And the hungry looks in their red eyes meant that we had to survive this if we were ever going to live through the night. Besides, I still had a father to visit and Karla still had to take some form of revenge over someone doing something. Hopefully we could get this over and done with quickly.

That was when the hellhounds decided to attack, their mouths open and drool flying everywhere. It was kind of gross, but at that point in time I was more focussed on trying to stay alive. Thankfully Glade had come to his senses when the hellhounds attacked and, brandishing the old crowbar in his hands, charged at the hellhound that was attacking Karla. John was too busy trying to shoot both of the hellhounds with his arrows. That left me with the hellhound that seemed to be Mrs O’Leary’s father! Why do I have to be the only that always gets the more deadly monsters?

The bad thing was Glade got one hit in on the head of the other hellhound before something sent him flying into a tree a few metres away. That something was the hellhound’s massive paw taking a swipe at him. He slid to the floor, now unable to help due to his now unconscious state. Once again, the crazy satyr gets knocked out during an important fight.

I cursed loudly and tried my best to destroy the hellhounds. Really, it was only Karla and I fighting. John was fighting, but because he was a long range fighter, he was keeping well back from the massive jaws of the hellhounds. I couldn’t blame him. They really needed a breath mint or two…hundred. Somewhere along those lines.

Just to prove I was right, my hellhound (I’ve decided to dub him Assassin) decided then would be a good time to try and bite my head off. And trust me; he really needed to go to an underworld vet or something to get his mouth cleaned out. I could literally see the remains of his last victims locked between his back teeth. There were arms, legs, things I had no clue what they were, I think he also found his way to Africa at one point in his hellish life because there was an elephant trunk in there as well. And some still had clothes and flesh on them. Not the kind of thing I wanted to see any time soon.

I did the only natural thing when you really didn’t want to become someone’s lunch: I held _Kleitos_ point up and lowered my head. The only thought I had in my mind, I admit, was ‘Mummy’. The next thing I knew was a very loud, very painful yowl. When I looked up, Assassin had backed away and was pawing at his mouth. But I hadn’t killed him. Black blood was dripping from the wound I had made. And his eyes, when they locked onto mine, were shining with an evil want to murder me even more than before.

In other words, I was in trouble. More trouble than the others.

And what did I do about it? I got angry. Don’t ask me why, but I got angry. Maybe it was because Assassin wanted to kill me really badly. Maybe it was because John had run out of arrows on the other hellhound and was now charging it with his dagger. Maybe it was because Karla had been flipped into the air and had landed with a horrible crunch on her side, her scream of pain echoing through my head as I realised she had broken something. Or maybe it was because there were hellhounds trying to kill me and my friends.

Either way, the two of us seemed to have a bit of an argument. Assassin would growl, so I would growl. Assassin would flex his claws and snarl, so I would hold _Kleitos_ harder and snarl. Assassin would take a swipe at me, so I would take a swipe at him. That’s pretty much how the argument went. I had no doubt in my mind that if it was under different circumstances, the scene would have looked very strange indeed.

But then Assassin got bored. Warning! Never stay long around a bored hellhound! There’s no telling what it would do. In my case, Assassin decided to leap at me with his jaws wide open again. I wondered about how many times he was going to do that. But still I thrust my sword into the soft palate of the hellhound’s mouth, once more managing to get it stuck. And that was when the angry centaur called.

“ _Lee! What do you think you’re doing? Where are you, John and Karla?”_ the sure sound of a rarely angry Chiron came from somewhere beside me.

“ Fighting a couple of extra-large hellhounds! What does it look like we’re doing?” I growled in reply.

Then I turned to my left and saw, not a physical centaur, but the cloudy image of a war counsel with a not-so-angry looking centaur right in front of me that told me that he really was worried about us and…well, to say he was angry would be an understatement. To be honest, I was more afraid of what Chiron would do to us when we got back than what would happen if I managed to lose my grip on my sword and/or Assassin managed to clamp his massive teeth around my body.

“ _I would appreciate it if you did not talk to me like that._ ” Chiron said, deadly calm. Not a good sign.

“ You know, you’re starting to sound like my father.” I mumbled before raising my voice. “ What is this thing anyway?”

“ _This is an Iris Message. But what I want to know is where you are?”_

“ We are on the other side of the city heading towards my dad’s place. And we are currently in the middle of a battle. Glade’s unconscious. Karla’s hurt. I’m not sure how long John is going to last considering…anyway, I’m in a bit of a stale mate with a hellhound! It’s trying to eat me!”

“ _Yes. We can see that. But next time, please tell us who you are taking with you and where you are planning on going. During these less drastic quests, we usually make sure that questers know where they were to start.”_

“ Less drastic. Less drastic! I was born for this quest! I’ve been waiting all my life for it! My family has wanted it for generations and you call it less drastic? Why I should-” I was cut off by John’s call as I realised that he was backed up to a tree.

“ Lee! I’m in trouble!” he called.

“ I’m coming!” I roared back before turning back to Chiron. “ Nice talking with you, but I’ve got to go. Bye.”

By that time, my vision had already dulled and become colour-blind. My senses had already sharpened and I could feel the wolf inside of me surfacing. But it was still too early for me to transform. My emotions had gotten out of hand. And that meant that my energy would drain faster in this state. There was no choice, though. John, Glade and Karla were in trouble and I was the only one who had somehow managed to keep going. I had to accept this or else they were going to die. And I was not going to let that happen.

“ Sorry, boy. It’s been nice knowing you, but now it’s time for you to go home.” I told the hellhound trying to eat me.

Assassin merely growled at me. But it was too late for that. I was already plunging _Kleitos_ deeper into his skull so that it pierced his brain. It was a sickening sight, but I was seeing red. My anger had blown like a volcano and the only way to turn it off was if I lost consciousness in some form. With a sickening yowl of pain, Assassin disintegrated into dust particles. But I didn’t stay long to say any last words to him.

I was already charging over to where John was with the other hellhound when what remained of Assassin was blown away by the wind. The hellhound didn’t even know I had killed its partner and was coming to kill it. It was keeping its focus on John, obviously trying to work out which part of him would taste better first. Let me tell you, it never got its chance. I somehow managed to leap onto its giant back without it noticing and sliced its throat…just seconds before it was about to bite into John.

The hellhound shuddered underneath me. It was literally dissolving under my grip like how those computerised villains disintegrate. The ears, which were the highest points on the canine, were the first things to dissolve closely followed by the rest of its body. Before I knew it, the hellhound had completely dissolved and I was falling to the hard ground below.

“ Well it’s about time you died!” John growled.

“ It’s not dead, dim-wit!” Karla yelled at him, pain raking her voice.

“ What do you mean?”

“ You can’t kill a monster. You can only make it disappear for a while. In the meantime, you make it really mad.”

“ That’s good and all, but maybe we should heal up before we make camp. John, see to Karla. I’m going to wake our personal guide of nature and tasty metals.” I said, returning _Kleitos_ to my wrist and pulling myself to my feet.

I walked over to the unconscious satyr, took the crowbar out of his hands and began waving it in front of his face, slowly coaxing him awake. It really didn’t take long. Then, once I was sure he was okay, I started to make a temporary camp. I know it was a bad idea to make a camp here, but there really wasn’t any other choice. I was still angry and my energy was still draining fast, and Karla sure wasn’t ready to go anywhere any time soon. When I was done, I leaned my back against a tree and, stabbing a stick I found into the ground, waited for my energy to completely vanish. Unfortunately Karla, John and Glade noticed.

“ Are you okay, Lee?” Glade asked.

“ I’m perfectly fine.” I replied in an unintended growl.

“ It’s just you look…” the satyr faltered with the sentence.

“ Like you’re about to pass out.” John finished for him.

“ That’s good.” I sighed, already feeling myself falling into unconsciousness.

“ You’re insane! You should take something!” Karla growled from where she lay nursing a broken rib and a broken arm.

“ No. You don’t understand. I need to…”

That was when I fainted.

* * *

When I woke up, it was morning. And I was still human. Which meant that I had completely missed any nightshifts that I should have taken. It also meant that I had probably become a wolf and gotten the others worried because animals and unconsciousness don’t go well together. The only good thing out of all this was that I was no longer angry. Slowly I sat up and noticed that Karla was watching me. John and Glade were still asleep.

“ Don’t ever do that again!” the daughter of Ares growled at me.

“ Do what? Faint? Isn’t it natural to faint after something like that?” I asked, my throat dry.

“ No! Scare us.”

“ Thanks for the concern, but I needed to.”

“ You’re insane.”

“ I know. But it was the only way. When my…” I faltered, not sure if I should continue.

“ When your…what?”

I decided to take the risk. “ When my emotions get out of control like they did yesterday, I basically turn into a super-human/super-wolf. My human form gains my wolf abilities or my wolf form goes into a werewolf like state, strengthening them greatly. It uses up by energy like there’s no tomorrow. And the only way to calm me down is if my energy is completely drained, which is why I faint.” I explained.

“ I thought you said that you’re not a werewolf.” Karla said suspiciously.

“ I’m not. I’m a cursed human. There is a difference. But, like I said before, when my emotions get out of hand in my wolf form, I go into a werewolf like state. I am not dangerous when it comes to turning other people into werewolves. I can’t do that. You’re safe.”

“ I can take care of myself, thank you! I will not hesitate to kill you!”

“ You don’t trust me?” I asked.

She never got a chance to reply because at that moment, John and Glade decided to wake up. We had a small breakfast in silence, Karla’s eyes watching my every move in case I really was what she believed me to be. Once we were done and camp had been cleared, we continued our long trek to my father’s place.

To speed things up, we managed to get a ride on the next bus to as near as Branchville as we could go. At first, I refused. But I was over-ruled and we ended up wasting a good half hour just trying to sort out the argument. Let’s just say you don’t want to get Karla annoyed over an argument. By the time we had finally finished the argument, we had to wait another twenty minutes for the bus to arrive.

In the end, the bus took us straight to Branchville. John and I had to wake Glade and Karla up when we got there because the drive had managed to loll them to sleep. But once we were all awake and off the bus, I took the lead once more. This time, however, I wasn’t about to let any one of them get any form of transportation that didn’t include the use of our feet. Meaning, we weren’t allowed to catch a train, bus, boat or car to my father’s place. And the excuse I made up on bikes was due to Glade being half goat. I wasn’t sure if he would be able to ride or not because of that fact.

After about five minutes on a lecture about what a satyr can and can’t do, we finally managed to get moving again. In silence, I led the others to my dad’s place on the outskirts of the township. But the instant we were standing in front of the small, blue, single-story building, I knew that it was no longer my old home. With a sigh, I began to turn around.

That’s when I noticed the old chew toy lying next to the trunk of an old black oak tree. It was a large, rubber dump truck and, if I remembered correctly, it had a squeaker thing built into it. It was faded red with the odd patches of weather aged white. But other than that, I knew that it had once been mine. I knew it had seen better days even though, really, I hadn’t seen it in months instead of years. Gingerly I went over and picked it up, an old and lifeless squeal coming from within it.

“ Is that a dog toy?” Karla asked in disgust.

“ So what if it is? It was the first toy I was ever allowed to play with in both forms. It was also the first toy that I sank my puppy teeth into that first night I ever transformed.” I replied, defending my childhood toy.

“ Nice to know a bit of your history. Can we go in now?” John said, getting impatient.

“ No.”

“ No?” three voices came back at me.

“ My dad no longer lives here. He never owned a car.” With that I pointed to the silver commodore in the driveway. “ And answer me this, why would we own a dog when we became dogs every night?” This time I pointed to the obvious Labrador mix that was enjoying a nice nap in the sun. “ This is no longer my home. Come on. We’ll probably find our answers in the Wolf’s Den.”

“ The Wolf’s Den?” Glade asked, clearly not liking what that could mean.

“ Yep. It’s in the forest.” I said, leading the way down the road towards the forest.

“ Of course.”


	13. Orphaned

The looks on my friends faces when they realised we were heading towards Bear Swamp Wildlife Management Area was priceless. It seems they couldn’t believe that my father would be living in a forest for however long it was. The thing was, I could. A pickpocket by day. A lone wolf by night. I had lived like that, so I knew that my father could too. It was a miserable life to lead, I know. But I hoped that Hermes was, as least, smiling down on him.

When we reached the entrance to the Wolf’s Den (which really was just a cave in the side of a rocky hill), no one knew what to say. My father and I, when I was younger, used to live in a rock cave part time. But I could instantly tell that my father was in the cave. His constant mutterings and what looked like the remains of his last meal were what gave him away.

“ Um…Dad!” I called nervously. “ I’m home! I need to ask you something!”

“ Oh! So now you decide to show your fu- (I have decided that you don’t need to hear/see this word) hide.” I heard my father reply. I waited in silence as he shuffled himself to the cave entrance. “ Seven months! That’s how long it took me to find you! Seven (a certain ‘f’ word has also been removed from this sentence) months! And you have the nerve to show yourself back here!? At my doorstep!”

My father looked a lot like me except he had red hair and hazel-gold eyes. And he had a small moustache growing on his face. But other than that, you could definitely tell that I was his son. He had a strong build that clearly defined his muscles and he had that Greek tan to his skin. Like everyone else in our family, he had pointed ears and a sharp nose. And even though he shuffled his feet along the ground, you could tell that he was a light walker. But what scared me most was that his clothes were tattered and torn and he had the same look in his eye that my grandfather had…one of someone going insane.

“ Well, maybe I wouldn’t have run away if it weren’t for you!” I growled back.

“ You ran away?” Karla asked me quietly.

“ Yep.” I replied softly, putting emphasis on the ‘p’.

“ Why must you always blame me!” my father growled, shuffling towards me like he was drunk.

“ Maybe because it’s your fault!” I retaliated.

The others were getting worried. So was I, for that matter. I hadn’t really wanted to spill my past to them like this. I had expected it to be more like a story around a campfire at night once the curse had been lifted. And my father, from the good times I remembered, never drank alcohol. He had always said that it was bad for me to be around the stuff. Not once, until now, did I suspect that he had tasted it before I was born and would return to its dastardly grasp and sickeningly soothing call.

Then I remembered something important. Something that changed my life forever. I was only six at the time. I would be seven not even a week later. During one of my random moments wandering through the house in search of something to do, I came across a room that was usually locked. The door was opened slightly and there was groaning coming from inside the room. When I peaked in, I found empty bottles and cigarette butts lying on the floor. My father was also lying on the floor and groaning in his sleep. I high-tailed it out of there faster than even a Hermes child and ran into my room where I began reading one of my many books.

Needless to say my father found out that I had seen him like that. I don’t know how he managed to find out. I was pretty good at avoiding telling him the truth when I needed to be. I don’t actually lie, as such. They were more a twist of the truth. But that was when he began to get rough with me. And if he ever caught me near that room again…let’s just say that the memories are too painful for me to bring up.

“ It was your choice to leave me in the dump hole, boy! You knew I (another currently missing ‘f’ word) needed you!” My father roared in my face, snapping me out of my memories with his alcoholic breath.

“ Then why did you leave me in the dark.” I replied quietly, hoping (and not succeeding) that the others wouldn’t hear me.

“ YOU SON OF A -”

“ My mother is one of the greatest goddesses this planet has ever seen! I will not let you of all people disrespect her! In fact, if it weren’t for Athena hearing your prayers, I wouldn’t be here now growling into the face of my drunken father for answers!” I cut him off with a growl, pushing him away from me.

“ So you know.” It wasn’t a question. More like a statement. And his voice was dark when he said it.

“ I’ve known for a very long time.”

“ Then get inside. All of you. We don’t want any prying ears.” He said, ushering us into the cave.

When I say ushering, I meant pushing me into the cave and making me fall flat on my face over a small stone…right in front of Karla. Gods, why am I even worried about that! I so don’t have a crush on her! But then again…okay, I am blaming my burning face on my father. In fact, my embarrassment quickly turned to anger when he kicked me in the head to try and get me up. That definitely made my face burn.

After I managed to get back onto my feet, and somehow managing to stop myself from decking my father in the process, I stormed into the cave and stood directly across from my dad. Karla, John and Glade cautiously followed, looking like they were interrupting some important ‘father-son’ thing. And I think I saw a scared glance from Glade. I guess he was sensing that he was in the home and presence of an even scarier wolf now. It never occurred to me that he was afraid of the stormy darkness my usually sad, light-grey eyes had become.

They were the only people in the cave to sit down. They found the most comfortable patches of ground at the most safest of distances away from me and my father before quickly sitting down. Meanwhile my father stood, swaying slightly due to his alcoholic predicament, directly across from where I stood. Both of us were basically glaring daggers at each other. In fact I was tempted to call out _Kleitos_ in sword form and run him through, but I needed the answers if I was ever going to succeed in this quest and end this curse.

“ I knew you would come for this one day.” My father said quietly but dangerously. “ But why now of all times, only the gods would know.”

“ Because of my destiny.” I growled back, equally as quiet and equally as dangerous. “ The reason why I’m here is because I want to know everything about my past. And I don’t just mean how you met my mother. I mean every little detail about the curse. I need you to explain to me what must be done for this effing curse to be lifted.”

“ You want to know? You want to know the conditions that that…that _goat_ gave your ancestor, Herodes, claimed over our blood?! You want to know why one of _his_ spawn is the only key to completing this damned task?!” His voice rose with every word.

“ I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t, now would I? Just tell me what I need to know and I’ll leave you to your miserable life.” My voice, however, remained the same.

“ Don’t you talk to me like that, young man!”

“ Okay, then. Just explain to me what Grandpa Wolf meant when he said that you once knew everything there is to know about our history and what I must do.”

“ You’re grandfather was an insane old fool. Why do you think he was where he was?”

“ He was saner than you are now! What would he say if he knew you were drinking? And don’t give me any crap about you not drinking. I can see the empty bottles lying around here not to mention smell it!” my anger got the better of me again.

“ You want to know why you’re here or not! Because, with the way you’re going, if you don’t shut up now, you won’t get it at all!”

I closed my mouth and lowered my eyes, not giving total dominance but not backing down either. My reasons? He was drunk and I didn’t want to let my guard down for even a second around him. Not to mention I was still angry with the way he had…or rather, was about to… disrespected both Athena and myself. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to notice my still tense posture. Either that or he just didn’t care.

“ You know the story. Back when your precious Gods were still roaming as reckless teenagers and young adults and us mortals were merely babies in their eyes, back when _his_ goat-y ass still walked the lands, your ancestor, Herodes, decided to murder the wolves of the area and feed them to his children. His only daughter out of his five children, Melantha, did not eat the meat that was served before her. For she had seen what her damned father had been doing. And she, being the ‘dark flower’ that she was, decided to take it upon herself to call forth the damned god who did this to us and damn her father and brothers to this infernal torture.

“ But she realised her mistake when she gave birth to the first of his grandchildren. A pair of twins; one boy and one girl. The girl, like her mother and all females of his blood after her, remained immune to the curse. However, her brother, did not. When Lysias was merely three months old, he turned into a pure white wolf. And that was when Melantha named her two children.

“ The only difference Lysias had in his wolf fur was the golden crescent moon in the middle of his back. He was the first non-offending white wolf. His uncles were all either black or grey. His grandfather was white and silver. But that didn’t matter for he had destroyed his mother’s life and confirmed her fears that _he_ had cursed _every_ male in her family…including the future generations. And he was named because of that.”

“ His name meant destroyer, didn’t it?” I guessed quietly.

“ Indeed it did. But his name, to his mother at the very least, meant the complete opposite of what yours does.”

“ What?”

But before he could answer, John interrupted. “ Excuse me for interrupting, but who is ‘he’?”

I decided to answer, to save the others from the wrath of my father. “ Now, Glade. Don’t get all psycho on us. But he means Pan. I’ll let you bag me out over it later. Just not now.”

“ How many times do I have to tell you! Don’t speak his name!” My father roared, his face going a deep purple.

I said nothing. I merely held out my hand towards my father lazily as if to tell the others that this was what I was trying to avoid. Glade looked pink, and not from embarrassment either. I would say it was more an even amount of anger and shock at my father and his ranting over Pan that made him look like that. Karla and John just looked stunned. You seriously couldn’t tell what was going on under those skulls of theirs. And I was seriously trying hard to find out what was going on. But Karla caught me and, with a growl and an extremely obvious warning, she easily made me turn back to my father.

“ Yeah, okay. Just tell me what I need to do and we’ll get out of here.” I said after a few minutes of realising that my father wasn’t going to calm down any time soon.

“ _Pan._ ” He spat and turned his head to the side so that he was looking out of the cave.

I don’t know what he saw out there because he instantly started muttering strings of prayers of protection under his breath. Some were in English, but the majority were in Greek. There were even a small few spoken in Ancient Greek. And let me tell you, those prayers weren’t short either. He was like that for a good fifteen minutes until he finally raked his hand over his heart and pushed the air away from him. I’ve learnt. When he does that, he’s serious.

“ This meeting must be quick, now. What were we talking about?” he said, all anger now replaced with fear and confusion.

“ Lysias and the meaning of his name.” I replied, slightly confused about what my father had said about my own name.

“ Yes. Before the old fool, Herodes, was killed by his eldest son, he visited little Lysias. He was only seven when he was told and my worst fears were that you would become like him. After he was told this, he went berserk. He killed all of his uncles and his mother and so it was he who started the line which you are a part of. And more importantly, must destroy.”

“ Okay, so Lysias went berserk and stole the vial that is around my neck, right?”

“ Right. He also killed a lot of Pan’s spawn in the process, but that’s not important. What is are these words. ‘Dark child of the white wolf, your dreams shall come true in the crystals glare when fire and ice within are laid dormant and the one who owes you a debt is finally given the chance to repay it. In this, life and death shall merge with the past and the present. You have been warned.’”

“ Seriously? That was a warning?” Karla said, and I could tell that she was about to make fun of what was said.

“ Those were the exact words spoken to Lysias by his grandfather Herodes.” My father replied.

But then he started fiddling with the ring that he always had on his right-hand middle finger. What’s more is that he started speaking in Greek again. And then there were the numerous times that the name Lysias was brought up. In fact, he was speaking so fast that was all I was sure the others could make sense of. I was able to piece some words and maybe a sentence together. But then again I’ve been exposed to it all my life. My grandfather refused to speak English while he was in the asylum. The next thing I knew was that my father had practically shoved his ring in my face.

“ Take it!” He ordered. “ Take it and go to see your grandfather! He’ll tell you where you need to go in order to calm your name sake! Take my bow and quiver and go! You will need them, I promise! Take everything I’ve just told you and go see your Grandpa Wolf! Go before it comes! The back entrance is open! Go!”

“ But…” I began, not sure what to do with the situation.

“ Lysias Eugenios Elpis Demian Evandar Harvey-King! Take the ring and the bow and quiver and go! Now!”

“ But his name is Lee!” Glade and John both protested.

“ What you know him as and what I have always called him was a combination of the first three capital letters of his real name. It made it a lot easier for everyone. Now GO! The Bow and quiver are already at the tunnel entrance.”

With that, he shoved the ring into my hand like a madman and began shoving me towards the back of the cave. Glade, Karla and John had no choice but to follow me. Though, the satyr did tense as he passed my father. Thankfully my father was too worried about getting me out of here to notice otherwise there would have been even more trouble.

When he turned to face the main entrance, I silently led the others into a secret passage behind a medium sized bookshelf. And no, it’s not like those secret passages that you see literally behind bookshelves in the movies. This bookshelf was backed up against a rock wall, but the rock wall was jutting out and so concealing a hidden passage. I found it accidentally when I was younger and together my dad and I explored where it led to.

But this time I wasn’t in the mood to go exploring. Instead I ushered the others deep into the dark passage way and told them to get down low and keep quiet. Then I moved my gym sack from my shoulder and onto the ground in front of me before going back to the entrance of the passageway and took my father’s bow and quiver from where he had placed them just behind the rock wall. Once I returned to my place with the others, I quietly placed the weapon on the ground next to my sack and crouched down, waiting and listening to the fight that my father was obviously trying to protect me from.

While I waited, I played with the ring my father gave me. And I cursed my ADHD for making me play with it while I was at it. The ring was a square shape and it was silver, as in real silver. And it was heavy too. On the two thicker sides, turquoise had been shaped into it in the form of a wolf’s head. The two thinner sides that rested on the finger were also carved with turquoise, but it wasn’t etched into anything. On the surface of the ring was a majestic looking wolf carved out of the silver that looked up at me as if expecting great things from me. There was no gem carved into the main image anywhere. Not even in its intricately carved, forest background complete with trees, rocks and grass.

Not once has my father ever taken it off since before the day I was born. Until now. I couldn’t understand why, though. Nor could I understand why he would give me the ring when he could still wear it. I never realised how late it really was until I stopped playing with the ring and placed it on my own middle finger on my right hand. Instantly, the ring adjusted to the size of my finger before I felt the familiar prickle of fur on the back of my neck.

 _No!_ I thought to myself, horror-struck. _Not now of all times._

I had no choice but to let my wolf form overtake me. And no matter how much pain I was in, I had to be silent. The others watched on in silence, not sure what to do. When it was over, I lay there in my wolf form trying not to pant too heavily. Then I realised something. Other than the little noise I was making, it was…quiet. Whatever my dad had been fighting, it was gone. I could sense it. And if my dad was hurt badly in human form, the change to wolf could very nearly kill him. Then I heard it. It was faint, but it made me move.

“ Lee, wait!” I heard John whisper as I dashed out of our hiding place.

But I didn’t reply. I couldn’t. The sight before me prevented that. My father, Licas, was practically dead before my eyes. His mostly white body was covered in red blood. Both his hind paws were broken. One of his forelegs was ripped off completely. His tail had been cut off with something sharp and one of his ears had been bitten off. My once proud father was broken. Slowly I made my way to his side and nudged his broken muzzle gently.

 _Lee, my son._ He whimpered through wolf talk, slightly opening his left eye. _I named you after your ancestor because I wanted you to become the destroyer of this curse of ours. You have not destroyed my life at all. In fact, what you did was what any wolf would have done. You found your life. Now you must live it._

 _But dad, what must I do?_ I whimpered in reply, not believing at all anything that was happening to me. _Why must I go to Grandpa Wolf?_

_You must calm the spirit of the white wolf Lysias. Only once that it done can you combine the drop of the satyr with the wolf, the fire of love and the ice of hate. When the four drops are combined, then you must strike the bloodied ring to the vial. It will break only then. But be warned… the ice of hate… is quickly warming and melting… into love…and with love… comes life…and death. Lee…Lysias…know how proud… you have made me. Your grandfather was right,… you’ll create your own fu-_

_Dad? Dad! No! Dad! No don’t…don’t go._

That night, the stars finally took my father. He left me as the only descendant alive that carried the curse of Pan.

That night, we buried the last white descendant of Herodes under a tree next to the cave entrance. We placed a layer of rocks over the dirt to try and prevent theft of his body by scavengers. We prayed in silence to the Gods, hoping that he was received well in the underworld and not found guilty of anything.

That night, no one slept. Glade was too worked up about what had happened earlier that afternoon. Karla couldn’t believe what had happened at all. John didn’t want me to stay up alone for fear I might do something drastic.

That night I howled. And I did not stop unless it was to take a breath. Then I continued my howling until the sun was up.

That night…I was alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I've been silent throughout the posting of this story, but I figured that I didn't need to say much unless I needed to as it is an older story of mine. As such, I now have something to add... at least to this chapter. Above, you got Lee's full name; Lysias Eugenios Elpis Demian Evander Harvey-King. And each name has a specific meaning:
> 
> Lysias (Lie-see-as): as stated above, it means destroyer. This was chosen in the hopes that Lee would destroy his curse.  
> Eugenios (You-hen-ee-os): means of noble descent. This was chosen due to the fact that Lee's mother was the Goddess Athena.  
> Elpis (we'll just say that it's pronounced as spelt): means hope. This was chosen to give hope to Lee so that he knew he could complete his quest.  
> Demian (Dem-ian): means to tame. This has something to do with calming the raging spirit of Lee's name-sake ancestor, Lysias.  
> Evander (sound as spelt): means archer. Again this also has something to do with calming the spirit of ancestor, Lysias. It also symbolises the fact that every member of Lee's family is skilled in the bow and arrow, as well as the weapon used by Herodes against the ancient wolves.  
> Lee's surname, Harvey-King, is actually his grandmother's surname. His grandfather, the insane Grandpa Wolf, decided that when he married, his children would be given his wife's surname instead of his. That way he, and he alone, took the Kaklamanakis surname and history to the grave when he died.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed this little tidbit of information and I hope to see you in the next chapter.


	14. Trapped At Niagara Falls

We spent another two nights in the cave before I was ready to leave. Glade wanted to get as far away from there as fast as he could the very next day. But one look at me told Karla and John that we weren’t going anywhere. When he tried to argue with them, two things happened. The first was that I picked myself up off the ground where I had been lying in front of my father’s grave and zombie-walked into the cave, where I sat against a wall and completely ignored everything. The second was Karla decked him, but not enough to knock him out.

Once that little scene had ended, Karla stormed over to where she and Glade had placed our stuff and went searching my sack for something that might cheer me up. Thinking it would help me somehow, she took out my Rubik’s Cube and one of my books. I didn’t move. I didn’t touch them. I just sat there staring at the cold ground under my feet. And I remained like that throughout the entire day.

Night came and still I did nothing. Not even when I was becoming a wolf. In fact I couldn’t even feel the pain of my skeleton reforming. For two nights, the transformation was silent. And I was still awake. But once I was wolf, I sat myself up and refused to budge. I didn’t eat or drink. It was like I had ceased to exist. And it was scaring the others.

I guess this it was it feels like for a god who is fading.

By the time the morning of the third day came around, I still hadn’t moved or ingested anything. John was getting really worried now and he ended up convincing Karla that I needed to be moved from the cave. However, Karla made a very good point; I knew the way back to the city, they didn’t. Surprisingly, that’s when Glade spoke up saying that he would be able to get us back to the city.

Now, I heard all of this but my mind didn’t register a thing. That was why, a few minutes later, I discovered that we were leaving the cave.

At first they tried to drag me up, but that didn’t work. I remained exactly where I was, not moving or doing anything. Then they tried coaxing me up. That didn’t work either. After much pleading, cursing, threatening, yelling and begging, my legs finally made me stand. But that just got them into trying to get me out of the cave. And no matter how much pulling, dragging, pushing, and, yes, carrying, they finally gave up as they watched me zombie-walk back into the cave for what had to be the tenth time. Karla sure was determined.

“ Lee, please. We need to get going.” John begged as he followed me back into the cave.

As per usual, I ignored him. I was beginning to feel sick. I was slowly coming out of my stupor. Slowly. But the sight of my father’s blood still layering the ground was making my empty stomach squirm.

Without realising what I was doing, I had walked over to the large chest that was in the darkest corner of the cave. It was just a plain wooden treasure chest, but it was what was inside it that I unknowing wanted. Inside, there was large, red gym bag. It was my dad’s, and it was used to carrying tools around, but, rightfully, it now belonged to me. I took it out of the chest and checked that nothing was in it before taking back my dad’s bow and quiver as well as my gym sack and began replanning my portable storage system. At least, my hands did the planning while my brain was otherwise dysfunctioning.

The first thing I did was place the bow and quiver over my back. I had been trained to take an arrow from the quiver over my shoulder, so it felt natural that that was where it went. Then I emptied everything from my gym sack into the gym bag. Once that was done, only the food and drinks remained in the sack. My sack had become a lunchbox.

From there I just went on auto-pilot. I had absolutely no memory of picking up the things and moving them into the bag. All I knew (and this is thanks to what I was told later) was that I had gone to the bookshelf and picked out quite a few thick books as well as ten Greek written books, a small set of drawers and dug out clean pairs of clothes, and what looked like a hidden safe before returning to the trunk and digging through what was in there. The only thing I truly remembered picking up was an old Greek shield with a wolf’s head on it.

It was mainly wood, but there was a thin coat of bronze on the outside of the shield. The straps were soaked animal skins and it really looked beaten up to the point where it would scare me when I was a kid. Now, the sight of it either made me sick or wonder what my history really was. I mean, who would want to see an image of a wolf with its skull cleaved open from where a sword once struck it?

What made it special, especially to my family, was that it was real. Like my ring, it was a family heirloom. Unlike my ring, it was much older. The ring was made, if I remember correctly, sometime after Jesus was born, when the Greek Gods and Goddesses were classed as myths. The shield was made way before that, during the time of the Greek Gods and Goddesses. It had been through war, handed down the generations to be placed on walls and polished, and now it has come back full circle. I was a modern day Greek soldier with a crowbar/sword/double-bladed pole arm, an ancient shield, a bow and quiver full of arrows, and the ability to turn into a large canine at night.

Once the shield was safely over my arm, I continued to pack my bag. Surprisingly, it only took three minutes. And I was in zombie mode. And with a shield on my arm, too. But after that, I seriously felt sick. I hadn’t moved that much in almost three days and my limbs were shaking and heavy. For the first time in my life, I was afraid that I was going to faint and not get knocked out. And for the first time in three days, I felt myself close my eyes tight and take a deep breath. I didn’t realise I had stumbled until after I found myself being held up by John.

“ Easy there, Lee. Don’t strain yourself.” He said, slowly trying to get me to sit down somewhere.

I tried to speak. I tried to say that he and Glade were right and had been from the beginning. But it was impossible. Nothing came out of my mouth. Not to mention I couldn’t even open it properly. And the weird thing was that I knew that I was weakening with every minute that passed by. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I began to wonder just how long it was going to take me to speak or even to faint.

My brain was slowly beginning to function again…or seemed like it, because I realised that the only other way I could let them know was if I did something. Somehow I managed to find the strength to pull myself away from John and pick up my bag. Then I walked out of the cave only to stop in front of my father’s grave. After a silent minute of respect, my head began to get dizzy and the next thing I knew was that I was backed up against a tree and breathing hard, John and Glade by my side with Karla in the background behind them.

I guess my brain was still a bit dysfunctional.

“ Here. Sip.” John was holding out a canteen.

Thinking it was water, I did. But when I tasted chicken noodle soup I instantly realised that it was Nectar. I can safely say that it was wise of John to give me Nectar and not Ambrosia because I definitely would not have been able to hold down food. As it was, I was struggling to keep down the Godly liquid. It was no surprise considering what I had gone through in the past few days. And although it gave me a little bit more strength than what I had, it still didn’t cure my inability to produce a sound. But John was too concerned to care.

“ You’re serious about going like this?” He asked me, taking away the canteen after a couple of sips.

I tried to say yes, but I could only manage a small nod. He understood and didn’t press me further on the topic. Fighting with me like this probably would have drained me faster than what he liked. But that still didn’t mean we had an idea of where to go. Slowly, so that my head didn’t go spinning again, I pulled from my pockets a folded up map. I had found it in the chest and my finger seemed to guide itself to our next destination. We were going to North Bay, Canada and we were going to go through Niagara Falls.

Forcing myself to my feet, I picked up my bag and slung it over my shoulder. Then, as easily as I could, I turned around and began walking away. This idea obviously was not what the others had in mind. They hurried after me and tried to get me to at least give my bag to Glade so that I wasn’t burdened with so much. This time, they won. I was too weak to argue… if you could call it that, that is.

To be honest, I’ve never seen a satyr so happy before as when he was carrying my bag. He looked proud doing it too, despite his concern for my health and safety. Almost like a little kid showing their father what they did and finally getting praise on the work they had done. But either way, we ended up walking back to town before we caught our ride to Niagara Falls. And this time we ended up paying the taxi driver to get us there.

I’m sure the driver wanted to get me to a hospital with the way I looked, but I ignored it. I had other things on my mind… like nothing and darkness. Karla sat in the front with the driver while John and Glade sat in the back with me. But despite the nectar that John gave me from time to time, the only thing my mind could process was that I wanted to be sick. And I wanted to close my eyes and forget everything, but the message my brain sent obviously didn’t get to its destination because my eyes remained open.

We ditched the taxi-driver about an hour before sunset. Thankfully we were near a small town when we did because John kept muttering under his breath about not wanting Karla scaring the driver to move faster in order to find one. Once the taxi had gone around the corner, Glade led us to an abandoned building on the edge of the town.

The place was spiders galore. It was evident by the mass of spider webs and arachnids in the broken windows, around the doors, on the plants, in the corners and even in the drain pipes. Basically everywhere you can think of there was at least one spider web and maybe a spider or two. And the bugs around the place seemed to love the metre tall grass.

Any normal child of Athena wouldn’t have gone anywhere near the place. They would have probably decided to set up camp on the other side of the road where they couldn’t be completely bothered by the spiders.

Me, on the other hand, stumbled into the house and into the kitchen where I curled up in the centre of the room. Spiders may not creep me out as much when there is only the odd one or two, but a whole army? Forget it! If my brain wasn’t frozen I probably would have been rocking back and forth for an hour waiting for the sun to go down.

As soon as I was a wolf, and regardless of what the others wanted, I picked myself up and left the house. Karla began protesting about me being a wimp and not manning up to the fact that we were in a house full of spiders. But, seeing John and Glade follow me out in a failing attempt to get me back inside, she gave up and followed me through the town and on towards the next town where we caught a new taxi after the sun had risen and I was human again.

We finally reached our destination around mid-afternoon on the second day. I was much the same way in the taxi as I was in the first, and the driver was too. In fact, I nearly threw up around lunch time after I somehow caught the scent of fried chicken from a restaurant we were passing. Karla, who had switched places with Glade, practically ordered John to give me some more nectar before roaring at the driver to get us to Niagara Falls before the sun went down and not bother about getting me to a hospital. And, even though he didn’t like the fact that he was being ordered around by a teenager, the driver obliged.

By the time I got out of the car, I was panting heavily. I stumbled out of the car and nearly stacked it on the curb if it hadn’t been for Glade and John. Together they half dragged me over to a large tree and rested me against it where John made me drink some more nectar. It would have been comical if I hadn’t had felt like I was going to be sick. John carrying me over to the tree would have looked fine; just a tall fifteen year old carrying another fifteen year old away from the road. But a ten year old carrying a fifteen year old? That would have been something. And the fact that there was a crowd made it worse for me.

“ We shouldn’t have left that cave.” Karla growled when she came over after paying the taxi-driver.

“ We needed to get him out of there otherwise he might never have gotten this far. At least now he’s drinking something.” John retaliated.

“ And explain to me why we needed to get him out of the cave?”

“ Did you not see him at dinner when the prophecy was given? He practically knew that his father was in trouble as soon as the second line was spoken. And then, when he returns home, it turns out that he was right. So of course he’s going to be in shock from this.”

“ So what. He lost his father. Big deal.”

“ It is a big deal, Karla! At least you’ve still got your brother and mother to turn to! Lee has no one anymore! The only family he’s ever known is now lying in a hole in the ground! Show some respect!”

In all the time I have known him, I have never heard John snap like that. It made me weakly lift my head and look at him in a sad attempt at surprise. His eyes were like blazing blue fires and his usually happy face was rock hard with anger and worry. But then I had to lower my head again because it decided to get dizzy when I had looked up. Glade seemed to have the only good idea as he sat next to me, rubbing circles on my back to try and help me.

“ Both of you shut up and calm down!” He ordered, which shocked the both of them into looking at him. “ This isn’t helping Lee at all. He’s still trying to get over what has happened. Now is not the time to be discussing something like that. Now, I’m going to go contact Chiron and let him know what’s happened. When I get back, I don’t want to see a stand-off.”

And with that, he patted my back gently and walked off. It was then that Karla noticed how late it was starting to get. She glanced at John and then at me, clearly indicating that they should get me out of public view. The only problem was that Glade would get worried if he came back to find the three of us missing. And, of course, they completely ignored what Glade has said and began arguing over what they were going to do.

They got their answer when a silver arrow embedded itself into the tree just above my head. Weakly I looked up and noticed the glint of silver on the other side of the road. I wasn’t sure if this was the welcoming committee, the private demigod police force, some form of weird mobile hospital or just a murderer that uses silver arrows. Either way, and it was probably only because of either the time of day or because I was seriously about to throw up, I began shaking. The next thing I knew was that I was toppling to the side, my vision fading.

“ We’ve found them, Lieutenant. But I don’t…” some young girl said as I faded into darkness.


	15. Hunters Of The Moon Goddess

“ Are you even sure this is the one we’re after? He looked pretty bad when we found him. And that was what, two hours before sunset?” someone whispered in the distance.

“ Are you thinking of dishonouring Lady Artemis, Nurita?” someone else said.

“ No! Of course not! I would never dishonour the one who gave me freedom from those evil Nazi men all those years ago!”

“ I can understand where Nurita is coming from, though. For someone who is supposed to be a child of Athena, why was he staying in an old house full of spiders?” another said. “ It’s just so out of character.”

“ Maybe the spiders got to him and the fear carried through the night.” The one who asked about the Nurita person dishonouring some lady thought aloud.

Everything was dark. I had no idea what was going on around me. And those whispered voices seemed to penetrate through my clouded mind. But their voices only seemed to create more fog than clear it. They sounded like young girls. And what’s more, they didn’t really sound very friendly to me. That’s when my ears picked up the sound of wolves.

 _What I do not understand is why a human entered that house and a wolf exited._ The sound of a she-wolf growled through my head.

 _That just confirms that this dark wolf is the one who we are looking for, Isis._ Another she-wolf growled.

_Then explain why there were three wolf scents in that cave from a few days back, Athala?_

_Obviously, from the blood, there was a fight._ A third she-wolf said in a matter-of-fact tone.

 _ONE OF THEM WAS HIDING, KEFIRA!_ The first two she-wolves barked at the third.

Okay…I think those she-wolves scare me. But then I heard some more familiar voices growling at each other in the distance.

“ I leave you for a few minutes to message Chiron and I come back to find Lee unconscious, you three arguing and a silver arrow embedded in the tree above where Lee’s head would have been! Why can you not follow a simple request?!” the sure sound of an angry Glade rang in my ears.

“ My orders were to find you and that is what I have done. I think I am able to follow orders, satyr!” a strange voice growled back.

“ No one orders me around, Goat-Boy!” the unmistakable growl of Karla.

“ Says the one who claims the death of someone elses father no big deal.” John’s voice grumbled.

“ Oh, that’s real smooth coming from…”

I don’t know what Karla was going to say because at that moment, my mind decided that it was going to shut itself down again and I was plunged into deeper darkness. But even that darkness seemed as haunting as the first. And I’m not joking when I say haunting. Standing in front of me was the grey form of a large wolf. It was clearly male but what creeped me out about him was that his body was creating its own mist to hide himself in and his eyes were glassy, cold and staring. As I watched, he opened his jaws in a wolfish grin.

 _Oh, I am going to have fun with you, Lysias._ He laughed before leaping right through me.

Now, if the whole ghost wolf and creepy voice didn’t scare me, the chill of said ghost wolf running through me did. You haven’t felt anything cold until you feel yourself being engulfed in the body of a ghost. It’s like having Antarctica come crashing down on you, frozen water and all. And it really made me feel sick.

When I began emerging from the darkness, the first thing I heard was John sprouting out seemingly random quotes from William Shakespeare’s _Othello_ and _King Richard III_. That is I thought they were random until I actually realised what he meant by them. I guess Karla must have really riled him up in order for him to start calling her things in Shakespearean. Whatever the case, the she-wolves were growling at him and there was a silent rustle as I sensed movement around me.

And that is when my brain decided that it was finally going to switch back on. It only took it about a week. But it finally got there. Slowly, my eyes opened and I realised that I was surrounded by trees. How that happened, I did not know. All I did know was that it was night time and my stomach really did feel like it was about to show itself. Weakly, I managed to move myself onto my stomach and just in time too. The next thing I knew was that my ears were filled with a sickening sound and the air to my left did not smell good. Well…there goes all the Nectar that had been in my system.

“ Lee!” I heard Glade exclaim.

He rushed over to me with John and Karla right behind him. I guess the sound of me being sick finally made them come to their senses. But they weren’t the only ones looking at me with concern. The she-wolves, all twelve of them in their gleaming white coats, were looking at me with pity, concern and worry. And I could tell that they were wondering why a sick young one was roaming the country like I was and in the state that I was in.

 _Please…Please tell me…tell me that was just a dream._ I panted huskily through my translator.

“ I’m sorry, man. That was no dream.” John muttered softly.

He shouldn’t have said that. The next thing that happened was that I threw up again. The memory of my father’s broken and bloodied body was resurfacing and the words that the ghost wolf spoke to me kept ringing in my ears. I wanted to cry but I was too weak even to howl. All I could think about was what was going to happen now.

“ Here.”

I looked down at the bowl he placed down in front of me. Thankfully it was just water. I didn’t think that I was going to be able to even look at another drop of Nectar let alone drink it. It was a slow and agonizing drink, but I finally managed to soothe my dry throat and stop my protesting stomach. Only then did I look up and noticed the swarm of silver-clad young teenage girls, the falcons, my fellow campers and my favourite satyr.

But the one that really stood out was the Lieutenant…or at least I think that’s what she was. She looked about my age with short spikey black hair, electric blue eyes and freckles across her nose. She wore a ‘death to barbie’ t-shirt (and though it freaked me out a little bit, I couldn’t agree more with the statement) underneath a silver parker, camouflage pants, a silver bracelet and a silver circlet on her head. She also had skull earrings on and was glaring at me like I was some sort of weirdo. I probably was considering the circumstances.

 _Who are you people?_ I asked after a few minutes of awkward silence.

“ We are the Hunters of Artemis and I am their lieutenant, Thalia.” The punk girl said. “ Who are you?”

 _I am…_ Who was I? Lee? Or Lysias? I decided to go with what everyone seemed to call me. _I am Lee Harvey-King, son of Athena and Licas Harvey-King. I am also the last living descendant of the wolf killer, Herodes, and I bear his curse. Now what do you want with me seeing as it is clear that you do not want any of my companions?_

“ What do you mean you bear a curse?”

“ He bears the curse of Pan. For what his ancestor had done, his entire family, including future generations, were cursed to become the very animal which he had killed by night. His true form will emerge when day breaks.” A stern voice said, though not unkindly like something in the back of my mind told me it should be.

This new speaker was a young girl about twelve years old, but the way her silvery yellow eyes pierced through my light grey eyes told me she was a lot older than what she appeared. Her auburn hair was gathered in a ponytail and she wore the same silver uniform as most of the other girls around her. But her clothes seemed to wrap around her like a nicely fitted dress and she radiated so much power that I had no doubt in my mind who she was. Reluctantly I lowered my head out of respect.

 _At least the pup knows that he is in the presence of Lady Artemis._ One of the she-wolves growled low.

 _I only bow out of respect over her status above me. I do not bow for her under any other circumstance. She killed an ancestor of mine. Why should I be any more respectful of her than what is necessary?_ I growled in response causing an uproar amongst the she-wolves.

 _That black-eyed assassin deserved what he got and so will you!_ An older she-wolf snarled at me.

_I have done nothing wrong! Stop blaming me and my family for a crime we didn’t commit!_

_But your family did commit it. And you will pay just like that weak assassin. At the never faltering hands of the Lady Artemis._ The she-wolf I recognised as Athala growled.

 _What have I ever done to you?_ I directed my question to everyone, but more specifically to Artemis and her wolves.

 _You were born._ The old she-wolf growled, prowling towards me and basically getting ready to kill me.

“ Peace! I want to hear what he has to say.” Artemis’s voice ran out, though I could sense a lot of silver arrows pointing at me.

I didn’t know what to say. Artemis wanted an explanation on my life, that I was sure. But I had no idea how I was going to explain any of it to her. I was still weak from my lack of… well, everything and I knew I had to watch what I said otherwise those she-wolves would be at my throat faster than you could say ‘ _Hakuna Matata_ ’. And next to that, I had so many questions buzzing around in my head I wasn’t sure how this was going to turn out.

“ Ask away then, son of Athena.”

How did she…? I put the thought out of my head and focused on more pressing matters. _Why did you kill Alejo? What did he do to deserve that kind of punishment?_ I asked instead.

“ He saw my hunt. And because of Pan’s curse, I couldn’t turn him into anything. Besides, no one can defy death three times. Or in the way he did.”

_What form did he die in?_

“ He was a wolf.”

 _Well no wonder he died._ I muttered to myself before asking my next question. _What do you want from me?_

“ We are after your ancestor and we have been for centuries. And you, Lee Harvey-King, are our ‘ticket’ to him. Your death will call him forward.”

_That will never happen for more than one reason._

“ Oh? Enlighten me.”

_For starters, I’m the last. I’m also the only one who can kill Lysias. And I have to do that if I ever want to lift the curse that is in effect at the moment. You have no right to take away what I was born to do._

“ And what is your birth right?”

 _To find and destroy my ancestor and my family’s curse. And this, I swear on the river Styx, I will accomplish._ I spoke in Greek knowing that, aside from the whole river Styx thing, I will accomplish my task.

Thunder rumbled. My pledge had been made official. But for some odd reason, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad was still going to happen. I shook my head and looked up at the others, trying to ignore the feeling, before my ears registered what Artemis was saying.

“ You would deny us our rights?” she asked, also in Greek.

 _No. You hunt your monsters. I’ll hunt mine._ Then my thoughts travelled to my father’s bow and arrows and I remembered that he used to polish the arrow tips with some kind of green paste. And that was when I realised why he wanted me to take them. _I have the only thing that can kill Lysias. And I pray you have no intensions of getting in my way._

“ Watch your tone, boy, or I will kill you.”

 _Do you have something against…wait, yes you do. Let me rephrase. Do you have something against_ cursed _men?_

For an answer, Artemis just glared at me. I guess she hated cursed men more than she did normal men…if that was at all possible. However, she surprised me when she ordered her lieutenant to set up camp and make sure that John, Karla, Glade and I were comfortable and had a place to sleep the night. I didn’t mind it though, I just wasn’t expecting it. Slowly, before I even realised, my eyes began to close.


	16. Haunted Dreams

_When I opened my eyes, I found myself back in the cave. But things were different. The wolf shield was hanging against the back of the wall and there was no blood on the ground. Everything was how it should have been seven years ago. I looked outside and got the biggest shock of my life. On the tree outside the cave was a target board. And standing in front of it was…me. But a younger version of me._

_I looked about eight but I had visible scars and bruises on my upper arms and other parts of my body. My once happy eyes were now sad, grey storms… the same kind of eyes I now had. My head looked like it had a black mop-head fall out of the sky and land on it and had then been ruffled by a sudden gust of wind. I was small for my age, being about two inches shorter than the average eight-year-old. But already I was starting to tone. I was dressed in a black singlet top and camouflage shorts. I even had a bandana around my head._

_In my hands was a simple wooden bow with and expertly made arrow notched to it. On my back was a quiver full of arrows. This was the time where my father had begun getting rough with me and started abusing me. This was the time where I became what I am now. This was when I was trained to hunt my own ancestor…and I didn’t even know it._

Well now. What do we have here? _A chilling voice chuckled beside me._

“ Get out of my head!” _I ordered, my human voice ringing through the cave._

_Outside, my younger self loosed the arrow and got a perfect target, completely unfazed by what was going on inside the cave. It was a little creepy, I admit, watching my memories happen and still be able to yell all I wanted without my dreams taking any notice. It meant that I was alone with a creepy ghost ancestor. And I did not like that idea._

How can I do that, young Lysias, when I am in your blood?

_And that was when the creepy ghost voice became a solid…um, I mean physical form. Wait, physical doesn’t really explain ghosts, does it? No. I think I need a lesson with Nico on spirit forms when I get back to camp. In the meantime, we’ll just say that the ghost appeared. Cue frozen chill straight down my spine._

_He looked at me with his cold, staring eyes. No…he looked into my soul. I know he did. But just like that, he disappeared again. And this time he left his eyes where they could easily watch me and otherwise freak me out. Needless to say, I had to turn away from the two glaring eyes that kept staring into my soul._

_At that moment, thank the gods, my father’s voice broke through the creepiness of the situation. Though his voice brought back memories of the night he was killed._

_“ That’s good, Lee.” He said, a rare laugh in his voice. “ Four in a row. And in a diamond formation at that. You’re doing better than me when I was your age. Load up another arrow and let’s see if you can’t get a fifth dead set in the centre.”_

_I watched my younger self follow my father’s orders and watched as the arrow flew straight over the target. I remembered what happened. My father was excited and he clapped his hand on my shoulder, making me flinch and release the bow before I was ready to release it. He had clapped his hand on a particularly tender bruise, but instead of doing anything about it he ordered me to try again… this time the laugh wasn’t there._

_“ Why am I doing this again, dad?” I heard myself ask as the new arrow found it mark in the centre of the diamond._

_“ Because, when you are older, you may…no, you will have to defend yourself against an ancient…opponent, shall I say. This is the only way.” My father replied, his voice stone cold._

_“ But… how can it be?” I silently cursed myself for asking that. I was nearly knocked out from the blow he gave me for asking it._

_“ Because it is. Now get your arrows and start again!”_

Your past intrigues me, young Lysias. I will keep a close watch on you. _The ghostly voice whispered in my ear._

_Only then did I realise that the ancient opponent that my dad had been telling me about was actually the very wolf that was haunting me at that very moment. The first Lysias. My father had been preparing me for the day I would have to kill a ghost. Does that sound weird? Because I know it felt it. But just like that, the ghost wolf fully formed again and leapt at me with his jaws opened as if waiting for when they would feel my neck in their grasp._

“ Nooo!” I screamed out, my eyes flying open just seconds before the ghost wolf reached my neck.

I was human, just like in my dream. I could tell by the fact that my voice was human. And again, my transformation had occurred without me knowing. Only this time, I wasn’t woken up by pain. I was woken up by fear. Breathing heavily, my hands shaking like never before, I felt the last of my fur retreat inside of me and my hair return to its normally short, scruffy style.

Around me, I heard the sound of people rushing to their feet and gathering weapons. The sound of wolves being woken up also came to my ears. But the only thing that I could focus on was that the sun was only just peeking through the trees and that I honestly thought a ghost wolf was going to kill me. Silently I prayed that I had only had a nightmare.

“ Lee! What’s wrong? What happened?” I heard John call as he rushed to my side.

“ It was…It was…nothing. It was nothing.” I stuttered, not convincing anyone.

“ Aww. Is the big, macho wolf-boy afraid of an itty, bitty dream?” Karla sneered in a mock baby voice.

“ Shut up, Townsend.” I growled quietly.

“ Just don’t be wussing out of this quest because of some stupid dream.”

“ I’m not wussing out of anything.”

“ Good, because I’m going to kick your ass halfway into next year if you do.”

“ Charming.” I muttered.

“ Are you sure it was nothing?” John asked, glaring up at Karla.

“ I’m fine. Karla’s right. It was just some stupid dream.” Even though it clearly wasn’t.

With that, I got up and, after splashing my face with water from a nearby stream, joined Artemis and her hunters for breakfast. It was the most awkward…scratch that, the second most awkward breakfast I had ever had in my life. The first being the first breakfast I had at camp right after everyone had watched me transform for the first time. Either way, being surrounded by a bunch of immortal girls that wanted to kill me wasn’t what I would call welcoming. The only ones who seemed okay (from both groups) were Glade and Thalia who were having an interesting conversation about satyrs, trees and demigods.

Artemis and I continued our discussion from the night before. She still wanted to know more about my family curse (as if she didn’t already know everything about it). And I still wanted to know why she had been hunting my family…especially Alejo. In the end, the only thing she told me was that my family was on the ‘most-wanted’ list that the Gods have and that Alejo had disgraced her even more by seeing her hunt. Which wasn’t much considering I had no idea that the gods even had a ‘most-wanted’ list. And I had traded everything I knew about my family and past for the information.

Once breakfast was over, Artemis practically kicked us out. She said something about telling Chiron about their meeting and how his students, or more specifically me, were not physically injured in any way. Thalia said something about trying to get the others at camp not to worry about us (to which Karla mumbled something along the lines of “ We’re perfectly capable of looking after ourselves, thank you very much.”). And the next thing I knew was that Artemis and her hunters were gone. Leaving us to continue on to North Bay, Canada.

So, with much arguing between the four of us, it was agreed that we would buy some camping supplies and some more food, hail a taxi and kick-out the driver, make sure that we had enough fuel, not let me drive and finally make our way up to North Bay. The only thing they couldn’t argue on was that I knew how to read a map and so knew how to get to our next destination and we couldn’t let Glade do it because of how old he looks. I also knew where my grandfather was buried and we were going to have to spend at least one night in a cemetery.

Getting the supplies and the taxi were easy. Karla, John and Glade went and got the supplies while I got the taxi. That was easy. Just pretend you were feeling sick, show the driver a ‘short-cut’ through a deserted street, knock the driver out and dump him on the side of the road, then drive back to pick up the others. The only satisfaction I got was driving out of the city. However that still didn’t go without argument.

“ Why are you driving, Wolf-boy?” Karla snarled as she got in the car.

“ Why do you want to know?” I replied, trying to look like a taxi driver.

“ Because you can’t drive!”

“ _Shut up_!” I hissed in Greek.

“ It’s true, but…” Glade added, also getting in the car.

“ It’s also true that there are people around.” I had returned to English.

“ I may hate it, especially when he nearly made me throw up by driving off the side of a building, but he does have brains.” John admitted, getting in the car himself.

“ What’s wrong with people being around here?” Glade asked, temporarily forgetting the plan.

“ Glade! Think!” Was all John said as I pulled out of the curb.

“ We’re in a stolen car with an illegal driver!” Karla snarled in Glade’s ear, whacking him on the back of the head in the process. “ I just hope you know what you’re doing, Wolf-boy.”

“ Hello! Son of Athena, here! We were born with plans for everything. As soon as we get out of the city I’ll pull over. But at the moment, the mortals think of me as a taxi driver…hopefully.” I replied, muttering that last word under my breath.

“ You couldn’t just drive into a deserted alleyway or street or something?”

“ No. No I couldn’t.”

“ Pull over right now! Smith, get in the front!” She ordered.

“ I can’t! We’re at road works! Besides, I know what I’m doing!”

“ You nearly got us killed last time!”

“ There were hellhounds after us! Do you blame me?”

“ No, not really.” Glade muttered before bleating like a frightened goat when Karla threatened to punch his face in.

“ As soon as we get past these road works, then you pull over and let John drive.” Karla snarled after a few minutes of glaring at Glade.

“ No. As soon as we get past these road works, I’ll continue my way out of the city and then I’ll let John drive. I would be getting him on the right path, you know.” I replied, a smirk playing in my eyes.

“ Why do I hate that plan?”

“ Because you hate me?”

“ Hey, guys. Can we just shut up about it, please?” John asked.

“ We giving you a headache?” I asked.

“ That too. But seriously, this is my first time out of America.”

“ Oh, are you scared?” Karla asked in mock concern.

“ No! I just have no idea where we’re going. I’m willing to let Lee at least drive us out of the city. So you two are going to shut up and continue with whatever is going on in Lee’s head, okay? Good. Lee, drive.” He said that without waiting for an answer and knowing full well that Karla didn’t like the idea at all.

He was very brave… either that or very confident that she wasn’t going to hurt him if she wanted him to drive. Next to that, Glade was looking very pale due to the fact that he was once again sitting between the two. I felt sorry for him. If Karla did blow (and she was close to it), he would get the full force of the attack. Thankfully it was only another couple of turns before John took the driver’s seat and I took the shot-gun seat. Then we drove, me guiding a slightly petrified son of Apollo, until we reached Huntsville and had to stop for the night.

Again, Glade found us a nice, quiet, abandoned shack in the woods on the edge of town that we could rest in. Thankfully, there weren’t that many spiders around otherwise I would have made John drive all night too. We had dinner once I had transformed and talked for a little while, then I took the first watch. When no monsters showed up, I woke John for his shift. Finally, after about ten minutes of not being able to sleep, my eyes closed.

* * *

_Things were peaceful. The wind was in my fur. The sun was on my back. The ground seemed to blur under my paws. I had been running for nearly an hour, but I was enjoying every minute of it. Just the rush was making me want to run more. I honestly felt like nothing could stop me or even try to kill me…like I was invincible. Of course, the best of dreams usually get turned into nightmares very, very quickly._

_I ran around a particularly large tree and leaped over a fallen log…and landed right in the middle of a giant spider’s web. Not the best place to be when there was a giant spider looking down at you from a particularly thick branch of the tree you just ran around. That was when I remembered that this was the main reason why I feared spiders._

_See, though my dad liked to torture spiders and I took pity on them, nothing would ever change the dreams I started having after I watched my dad eat his first spider. They usually encased a normal sized wolf (me) being eaten by a large spider (like those acromantula things from Harry Potter). Basically it was a reversed situation to the spiders that my dad used to eat. And it is because of that that I think any number of spiders greater than five in the same place at the one time all looking at me will mutate into a giant spider and come eat me. That is also why I decided to ditch the abandoned house spider hotel as soon as I was a wolf._

Well, well, well. Look who’s gotten themselves in trouble now.

_Oh, great. Ghost wolf was back. That’s just what I needed._

Why don’t you get out of my head? _I growled, still struggling to get free of the web._

Because, Lysias, I am in your blood. I don’t need to be in your mind to be a part of you. You just have to be born of my grandfather’s blood…more specifically, my blood. _The cold eyes had made an appearance above the log I had jumped._

_I struggled some more against the web, trying to run from both the spider and the creepy pair of eyes glowering down at me like I was some kind of bug. But, of course, this only made the spider move closer. I froze. Probably more out of fear than anything else. That wasn’t the only thing that scared me though. The cold, glowering pair of eyes had gained a body…and that body was at least the size of a polar bear (and trust me, polar bears are the largest carnivore on land. Now imaging a ghost wolf that size. Scary? You bet) and had fog billowing off it._

Oh, I will enjoy this. _The ghost wolf laughed, raising its head to the sky and giving a bone chilling, blood curdling howl._


	17. Surprises In The Graveyard

_Not only did his howl make me feel very insignificant and vulnerable, it also annoyed the spider into thinking that it was me that was howling. Probably very hungry by now, it resumed its march towards me. The fact that I could hear its mandibles clicking away hungrily as it approached made me panic. My heart pounded in my chest as a soft whimper escaped me. But to make matters worse, the ghost wolf disappeared completely, leaving me to deal with the menace of my life. Alone. I’m really starting to hate that wolf now._

_I tried everything to escape. And I mean everything. Growling. Biting. Struggling. Tearing at the web. Everything I could think of. The only thing that happened was I remained stuck fast and the spider was getting closer. It was times like this that I decided I really hated my life. And as the spider got closer, I began whimpering. Without realising, I began imagining what Karla would say if she discovered what kind of situation I was in._

Shut up and man up. _I was sure she would say along with a few punches and maybe some kicks, but most definitely growling and ordering me around._ It’s just a freaking bug.

Yeah. _I told myself._ A freaking bug that’s like five times my size, angry and looking very, very hungry. I’m not going to last long.

_By this time, of course, the spider had reached me and was pinning me down with one of its massive, furry legs. It was CREEPY! Chills were running through my entire body. My fur was standing on end. And I was certain that my heart was going to either stop beating altogether or else jump out of my chest. That’s how bad it was. Then the angry giant hungry spider decided to bite into my back. Not the best feeling in the world. It felt like a million daggers and it was very painful. Ghost wolf would have been happy._

_As if on cue, ghost wolf’s laugh rang through the forest. And Mr Giant Spider didn’t like that at all. Neither did I for that matter, because Mr Giant Spider thought that_ I _was the one who was laughing. It dug its leg into my shoulder and bit into my back again. Warm blood pooled out of the wounds, dripping onto the web and turning it red. The scent and the pain made me howl out, practically begging for mercy. And ghost wolf’s laugh rang on through the trees, harder and louder than before._

This has probably been one of the best days of my existence, did you know that Lysias? _He said after a few minutes of me screaming and howling out in pain._

I couldn’t care less. _I growled through the pain._

Lysias. Lysias. Lysias. You should care. I have been a very unhappy person for a very, very long time. That has changed. And this has all been possible because of you. You are very interesting. Intriguing, almost.

I am not you’re play-thing!

How wrong you are, demigod. To think, your father had become so desperate in trying to break this curse of ours that he ended up turning to the very forces which gave us the curse in the first place. How foolish.

Says the guy who killed his entire family.

_By this time, my growl had weakened due to the loss of blood from all the wounds the giant spider was inflicting on me. My body was shaking uncontrollably. My mind was fading in and out of consciousness. And the pain only worsened with each attack. But one thing was clear to me. This was not part of my old dreams. This was new._

Do you like my little gift, Lysias? _Ghost wolf asked in mock question._ All your most interesting dreams belong to me. I control when you wake from them from now on… if you wake at all. _I didn’t like how he said that. But he kept going._ You see, Lysias. I also have control over your intriguing imagination. I can make you suffer beyond belief. Just like I did your father and his father before him and so on. I am your worst nightmare, Lysias, and there is nothing you can do about it. Consider yourself lucky, Lysias…

_And that was the last thing I remembered before everything went black. My breath came as short rasps for air. My body was shaking like I had spent the night in the bottom of a frozen lake in the middle of winter. My fur was caked with blood. And in the back of my mind, I could hear voices calling out to me. For a second I wondered if I was going insane. But then I realised that they were the voices of my friends._

_“ Lee!” they called over and over again._

_It was John and Glade. They were trying to wake me up. But I couldn’t make out where their voices were coming from. I was in that much pain that my mind was clouded with it. My brain was only registering the pain and the blood. And then Karla happened. I swear, one of these days I’m going to kiss her for being able to snap me out of deadly situations like this. That is, if we all make it out of here alive._

_“ If you don’t open your eyes this instant, wolf-boy, gods help me you will not know what hit you.” She growled._

_I don’t know how she did it, but she did it._

* * *

Breathing heavily, I slowly opened my eyes. It was still night, but I was sure that the sun was bound to rise soon. But what confused me was the fact that my vision was blurry, not from sleep but from pain. It was like my nightmare…had come to life. As if to prove I was right, my body shook like I was the only one feeling the effects of an earthquake. And to make matters worse, my mind was shocked into gear when something damp pressed into my shoulder and instantly making me yelp.

 _I can make you suffer beyond belief._ Were the words that entered my mind as the sting in my shoulder woke it up.

I knew what had happened. I knew exactly what was going on. Ghost wolf, or more accurately Lysias, had somehow figured out how to make dreams become reality. And I knew why he had lengthened my nightmare. He knew that the giant spider was going to attack me if I didn’t wake up. That was why he showed up… to make sure I didn’t wake.

“ Why were you slacking off, Glade? We could have all been killed! You were supposed to be watching the camp!” Karla was growling. The poor satyr was probably quaking in fear.

“ I-I…I was. I was watching the camp. I-I-I…I don’t know what happened.” Glade replied.

“ Then explain to me why his shoulder is drenched in blood and it wasn’t my doing.”

 _I feel loved._ I thought to myself as the pain began to dim, the initial shock having subsided.

“ I don’t get it either. What kind of monster shows up, attacks one of us and then leaves… without a sound or a way to track it down? Nothing can do that except a ghost, right?” John asked.

 _It was._ I managed to say weakly, through my translator.

“ What?” Three voices asked as one.

_It was a ghost._

They started asking questions, but for some strange reason I couldn’t hear them. All I could hear was a low, threatening growl, like something was about to pounce on me and rip my throat out. And my body shook with cold. In the distance, the sun was beginning to rise. I had, I’m pretty sure, only a few precious seconds before the transformation began.

 _Not a word or tonight you’ll find it harder to wake up._ Was the only warning I got from Lysias’s spirit before the transformation began.

Once again the screaming and howling started. Five minutes was all I needed. Five minutes was all it took. Then I was curling up in the foetal position while I tried to regain some strength. My shoulder complained, though. It did not like the transformation. But, thankfully, John handed me a small square of Ambrosia. And as the taste of lemon sherbet ice-cream filled my mouth, I felt my energy and strength returning. The wound in my shoulder, however, did not heal.

“ Ow.” Was all I could say as I tried to get to my feet.

No thank you or nothing. Just ow. And just a short, faint mutter at that. But John knew what I meant to say…even if he was concerned for me. He had every right to be. The wound in my shoulder had begun to bleed again now that I had transformed and my shirt was soaking up the blood. Of course that was nothing compared to the massive hole in it. It was just one less shirt to worry about, you know.

No, I am not vain. It’s called sarcasm.

I ended up having to take the shirt off because the fabric was irritating the wound that badly. And that was painful enough. John, however, had to go all doctor on me. Before I knew it, he had rolls of medical bandages, gauze pads, creams, cloths and a whole lot of other stuff my eyes raced over but my mind couldn’t comprehend. And as much as it killed, I let him fix me up as best as he could. One thing was clear, though. I needed to get back to camp before that wound would be able to heal… if ever.

So it was that, after ten minutes of pain and random thoughts of ghosts and death and other horrific scenes buzzing through my mind, I finally had my shoulder bandaged. The good thing, I was still able to fight, to some degree. The bad thing, the wound needed a lot of bandages that could have been useful for other emergencies. To be honest, I don’t think my back was ever going to be the same again… or my shoulder blade for that matter.

After a quick breakfast of dry bread, water and a piece of fruit, we hit the road again. My old shirt was used as a makeshift pillow to try and minimize the pain created by the drive. But it still hurt like Hades. Something to do with massive holes in the shoulder blade and muscle didn’t work well with hour long drives.

I was in that much pain, we ended up pulling over so that Glade could take over the role as navigator. Somehow I managed to tell the small satyr that we needed to get to Forest Lawn Cemetery in North Bay, but I honestly don’t remember saying it. I was moved into the back, with my head on Karla’s leg and Karla holding something cold against my shoulder. She wasn’t very happy with the arrangements, but the second whatever it was touched my shoulder I ended up passing out from the pain.

* * *

I came too with the sun glaring in my eyes and my head on something soft but firm. Something was being fed to me, but I had no idea what it was. All I knew was that it tasted like chocolate mint pudding. And my shoulder no longer felt like it was attached to the rest of my body any more. I wonder how that happened.

“ Lee? We’re here.” John said as I winced at the sun light and somehow managed to get up.

“ It’s about time you woke up.” Karla grumbled, but I noticed that her usually present growl wasn’t there. “ We’ve been waiting for you to get up for the past…for nearly the entire day.”

I let that register in my head before I answered. “ What?”

“ We moved you into the back seat with Karla so that you could keep the pressure off your shoulder.” John replied, receiving a glare from said daughter of Ares. “ She didn’t really like it, but she had no other choice; I was driving and Glade was the only other one who could get us here.”

“ Where is here?” I asked huskily.

“ The cemetery your grandfather’s buried in.”

Sure enough, when I looked up through the window I noticed that we were in front of the gates to Forest Lawn Cemetery. To be honest, I didn’t take much notice of the place. All I could think about was the last time my grandfather spoke to me and how freaked out I was.

“ Ditch the car. Let’s go.” I heard myself say before grabbing my stuff and leading the way into the cemetery.

“ But…” Karla mumbled, but only I heard.

“ Chicken, Townsend?” I taunted.

“ No!” She growled back.

“ Then let’s go. And leave the car here.”

The others didn’t question me any further, though Karla did tend to want to stay close to us. That was when I figured out at least one of her fears. And something told me that she would pulverise me if I ever leaked it out. I actually felt sorry for keeping her here over night. But things had to be done…and I had no clue on how to do it. Strange… for a child of Athena.

It didn’t help that my grandfather was buried in the farthest corner of the cemetery. It meant that, by the time we were half-way through the place, the sun had gone down. And when the sun went down, I became a wolf. Trust me, the last thing you want to see in a graveyard is a guy turning into a wolf when the sun goes down.

“ You don’t know how disgusting that is, do you?” Karla growled, though I could sense her fear by this time.

 _You think it looks disgusting. The pain is much worse._ I replied.

“ How much worse?”

_Field of Punishment worse. Or a taste of, at the very least._

“ Nice to know.” John and Glade mumbled under their breaths.

I silenced them by continuing walking. They had no choice but to follow if they wanted to stay with me and not lost in a place filled with dead bodies and, more than likely, ghosts. Karla noticed that I was leaving and grabbed John and Glade by their arms and dragged them after me. Not long after that, we turned off the main path.

My grandfather’s headstone was easily to find. Even in the dark you could make it out. It was a life-size stone wolf sitting on the ground and howling. I don’t know what my grandfather was thinking when he wanted that as his headstone, but I did know that he had an argument with my dad and uncle over it before he went insane and had to be put in the asylum.

“ Is that it?” Glade asked when we got there, pulling himself from Karla’s grip and rubbing his arm gingerly. “ Is that your grandfather’s grave?”

 _Yep. Made it himself and demanded it be used specifically for this._ I replied, sniffing around at the stone wolf trying to work out how my grandfather was to tell me where Lysias was.

“ Do you have to do that? Especially there?” Karla growled, as I passed its back.

_You want to know where we’re going next?_

“ Yeah.”

_Then shut up._

“ I didn’t know you were that sensitive, Karla.” John smirked.

“ You will learn to hold your tongue, Smith, or you will regret ever meeting me. Is that understood?” Karla snapped, pulling out her dagger.

To show he understood, he gulped loudly and nodded his head. Wise decision. I did not want blood on my crazy grandfather’s grave. That would just be disrespectful. Speaking of disrespectful, I guess Karla did mean something when she told me to stop. However, despite the murderous looks that John was getting from Karla and my quickly failing search, Glade was the one to find something strange about the statue.

“ Guys, what’s this?” the satyr called out, his voice almost ringing through the graveyard.

We all stopped what we were doing and turned to find him pointing at a shape etched into the wolf’s chest. It was long and thin, like a rectangle, and had a trapezium shape on the top of it. It looked similar to the vial around my neck. And that was when I understood.

“ It sort of looks like your vial thingy.” Karla said, squinting at the stone.

 _It is exactly like my vial ‘thingy’. Oh, and for your information, ‘thingy’ isn’t a proper word._ I replied, flinching inwards slightly at her words.

“ It looks like it’s been carved out to fit something in it.” Glade explained while Karla was busy glaring at me.

“ Then what do we do? Find something that matches the shape or something?” John asked.

 _We already have it, John._ I said, completely ignoring Karla.

“ We do?”

_Yeah. I’m wearing it. Take the vial from around my neck and place it around the stone wolf’s neck. Make sure that the vial is sitting in the carved out vial._

He did and instantly I felt like I was free of a very heavy burden. But that still didn’t mean that I wasn’t slightly concerned about what happened next. Because, believe me, I was. As soon as John had taken the vial off me and placed it around the stone wolf’s neck, the stone began to grind against itself like old gears being used after years of doing nothing.

It was like living a small scene from a horror movie. The stone wolf lowered its head very slowly and very painfully. Once its nose was pointing to the ground at my paws, it stopped. None of us moved. Karla was as stiff as a board and was pointing her dagger at it, not that it would do anything. It was best to leave her be at the moment.

When we finally thought that it wasn’t going to do anything else, the stone wolf opened its mouth. Its stone gears must have been a tad-bit rusty from lack of use. In fact, I could see dust and ground stone falling off its jaws as it did so. I wondered when my grandfather had actually made this… and how he managed to make it.

Nearly two minutes later, and scaring the living daylights out of all of us, a rocket propelled tube shot out of its mouth and landed at my feet. No one did anything. I don’t even think any one of us breathed at that moment. All I knew was that my grandfather’s headstone was shooting things at me.

“ That’s not…” Glade began slowly, but he was cut off when we heard a whirring sound coming from inside the headstone.

The sound reminded me of a vending machine that was collecting your can of drink or chocolate or whatever. It made me wonder what else it had been forced to swallow. It also made me wonder how insane my grandfather really was when he was placed in the asylum in the first place. And, just as I thought, another tube was shot out of the wolf’s mouth not long afterwards. I wondered how many it had eaten.

“ Is that…” John began slowly, in the same under tone as Glade.

Like Glade before him, John was silenced by a third tube being shot out of the wolf’s mouth. Again no one said anything, just in case. It turned out we didn’t need anything else after that third tube. The wolf’s mouth snapped closed and it raised its head to look like it was howling, never moving…forever empty. I couldn’t say solid due to the fact that it had just spat out three tubes at me.

“ That was…” Glade began again, in the same tone as before.

“ …Eventful.” John finished for him, also in the same tone.

I looked down at my paws. Lying there on the ground were three scroll tubes. Each one was decorated in Greek Mythological artworks and whatever words were on them were written in Greek. But it was the second scroll which looked slightly different from the other two. It had images of wolves and my wolf shield on it. It was obviously the more dangerous of the three. The other two probably only had scrolls in them. But only one thing was on my mind.

 _Why would my grandfather rig his headstone to shot scroll tubes at me, his own grandson… his own flesh and blood?_ I muttered out loud.

“ Well you did say he was insane.” John answered me.

“ Makes me wonder just how insane he was.” Glade muttered.

 _Me too. Anyway, do not open the tubes. Let’s just put them in my bag and we’ll leave._ I said. _John, can you please do me the honours?_

“ I guess I can.” John replied.

The first thing he did was put the scroll tubes into my bag. Then he returned the vial to my neck, instantly making me feel relieved to know that I had it but once more burdened. I noticed that Karla had not said anything from the time the stone wolf moved. She was gripping her dagger as if it were her life-line and she looked really pale. I was afraid that she was going to faint right there and then. But before anything else could be said or done, a blinding white flash of light burst in our eyes and the four of us were dragged into it.


	18. Off-Course

When I was finally able to make sense of my surroundings, the first thing I thought was _trouble_. I was filling up with anger and I didn’t know why. My fur was also rising, as if in anticipation to something happening. And I wasn’t sure if that something was good or bad or just plain scary. Though I was sure that it was one of them.

My nose twitched a little after that feeling and I was able to catch a confusing mixture of scents like gunpowder, metal, smoke, wood, fabric and paper. My ears picked up the sound of two men arguing… or more like someone was yelling while the other was trying (and failing) at getting the first guy to understand the situation. That was when I opened my eyes and looked around to find Karla, John and Glade still unconscious beside me.

Weakly, I lifted my head to take in my surroundings. There were radar panels and thick tubes everywhere. Not to mention the barriers and the ‘do not touch’ signs. But there was no sign of wood, paper, fabric or gunpowder to be seen anywhere. As my mind cleared a little I was able to make out the porthole like dials that showed compass directions, speed, distance etc. That was when I realised that we were on some kind of old ship… war ship, I think. Either way, as I was looking around, Glade began stirring.

“ Wha…” He slurred, alerting me to the fact that he was waking.

 _Shhh. We’re on some ship with a couple of angry men on board. Best not to aggravate them even further._ I whispered, though I wasn’t sure if it was through the translator or through wolf speak. Being a satyr, Glade would have understood both.

“ Ares, listen to me!” Someone growled when the yelling was paused for a breath. It was the guy that was failing at explaining the situation. “ These kids are on a quest! I had no choice but to bring them along!”

“ Oh, keep your tunic on, Punk. Just send the others back. I only want my daughter.” Ares replied in a growl that suggested he was faking calm.

He must have been angry because when things went semi-quiet, he began yelling at the top of his lungs again. It was giving me a headache. And poor Glade really looked like he was about to soil himself out of fear. It was then that my brain registered the name Ares and it was no wonder why Glade was as frightened as he was. We had been kidnapped by someone on the orders of the war god himself. I knew this was trouble.

I wasn’t surprised when John and Karla woke up not long after the yelling started up again. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if they woke up because of the yelling. Of course, John nearly got knocked out again by Karla when she lashed out blindly, no doubt thinking that our kidnapper was somewhere nearby. And of course, I looked out of the nearby window and noticed that the sun was just coming up.

Great. Things probably just got messy.

Five minutes later I lay curled up on the ground and panting heavily. I was handed a small square of ambrosia from my pack, but my shoulder felt like it was on fire. It was that bad I literally had tears in my eyes. John quietly ordered me to take off my shirt so he could check my wound and, once I had, he cursed.

At the time, it was just a soft mutter under his breath. But, by the gods, I couldn’t help but wonder what it looked like. Very slowly and very carefully, John began to unwrap the bandages. Was it painful? Yes. Yes, it was. But he did try not to make it painful. He placed the bandages on the floor next to me and I noticed that blood was literally dripping from them. That was why John cursed. But he cursed louder when he saw my shoulder. And harder.

“ That doesn’t look too healthy.” Karla noted.

“ It’s not. Get me my pack.” John ordered her.

Karla did as she was told, which surprised me considering she was one of those people who would have preferred to stand there and argue about being told what to do. Thankfully, we had the decency to bring our bags with us into the cemetery otherwise we probably would have left our stuff in Canada. I say this because I am pretty sure we were no longer in Canada. Either way, as soon as John had opened his bag and pressed something damp over the wound, probably to try and clean it or something, I let out the loudest howl of pain ever.

Okay, so you’ve probably had a needle at some point in your life or you’ve broken your arm or leg. Well, this was worse. It was like having every bone in your body broken over and over and over again until you literally thought that you were going to die. And to top it off, an adult male elephant jumping on you while wringing your neck with its trunk and basically pinning you down while vultures pecked at your eyes and really strong acid disintegrated your innards. Not a very pretty image, is it?

I was in that much pain, my vision had begun to blur. I honestly couldn’t make out pale flesh from grey wall. When I had stopped screaming, someone said something about Nectar and the next thing I knew was that a cool liquid was washing onto my lips. Nearly half a minute later I realised that I had been given some of the godly drink, but my mind was still paralysed with pain to register what it tasted like. My vision wasn’t as bad after that, but that was when I realised that our host and kidnapper had stopped yelling at each other.

“ L-l-l-lord Ares. L-l-l-lord Hermes.” I managed to make out as Glade stuttered away beside me.

More words were spoken, but all I could make out from the buzz of pain in my head was just that… more buzz. It was just mixed jumbles of words put on low volume. Basically it was dyslexia but for my ears. Now I had an idea of what it was like for John when he was trying to read something.

Okay, I admit. I did hear some words like ‘he’ and ‘cursed’ and ‘quest’ as well as names, but they were so few and spaced out that I wasn’t sure what people were talking about. And the fact that multiple people said those words a lot made it even more difficult to work out what was being said. All I knew was that someone said some words in Ancient Greek (I think it was Hermes if not it was John praying to his father) and something happened to the bandages before my eyes closed and I fell to the side.

* * *

Oh, yes. Such a lovely gift, isn’t it. I do hope you enjoy it while you last. _Lysias’s laughter echoed through my head._

_Everything was dark and my shoulder was completely numb. My arm felt useless and I doubted that I was going to be able to use it at all by the time we got back to camp. I wondered why Lysias had decided to annoy me this time. Knowing him, he wanted to revel in my pain like it was some kind of hilarious comedy routine. I wisely said nothing._

I know you have questions. You always have questions. That’s just who you are. Now. Speak and let them be answered.

_Still I did not say a word. But I could feel his anger growing at my silence. I knew I should have been scared. It would have been wise if I was because then he would not have gotten angry like he did. Unfortunately I didn’t listen to the majority of my brain. Instead I listened to that very small part of my brain that said it wanted me to be strong and defiant and otherwise prove that Lysias wasn’t going to scare me or control me like he had the rest of my family._

_Was it smart? At the time, no. It was dumb. You seriously do not want to make an already angry spirit even angrier. And that’s exactly what I did. I made him angrier. Though I didn’t exactly know how I made him angry in the first place._

Just your very existence, Lysias. _Great. Now he’s reading my mind._ And your annoying habit of not speaking when your elders order you to.

_Okay, that does it. All that anger that I was getting off Ares and being kidnapped was going into the destruction of this ghost. And still I kept my mouth shut. However, I did look around the darkness for any sign of where the ghost was. It was impossible. He was not going to let me find him that easily. But two could play at that game._

You stubborn fool! _Lysias growled._

_Then my back felt like it was being split open with twenty lashes of a cat o nine-tails. My back arched and I had to bite my tongue so I didn’t scream out. I felt my blood trickle from the wounds and instantly felt sick. This was not how I imagined myself dying._

The spider was only the beginning. I will give you five days to live.

_On those last words I was thrust into pure, solid darkness._

* * *

“ Lee, what’s happening to you?” John asked when I opened my eyes.

“ I told you. It was a ghost.” I hissed through the pain I felt.

“ But that’s all you said. Why is your back now covered in blood and lacerations?”

 _Not a word, boy, or I swear on the heads of the gods that you will regret it later._ Lysias’s voice cut into my mind.

 _Stuff you._ I thought back before opening my mouth to speak. “ The demented ghost of my ancestor is trying to kill me. He says I only have five days to live.” I said.

John, Glade and Karla all stared at me in shock and disbelief. And in the back of my head, Lysias was most definitely planning my painful death. I could hear him grumbling to himself. It was creepy. On the bright side, I knew what he was planning. But that was when I noticed the sound of a train running over its tracks.

“ Where are we?” I asked, ignoring the looks on my friends’ faces.

“ The Olympian Express. You’ll be in Yuba City by the time the sun sets. I managed to get you on board somewhere in Kansas…I think. If not Oklahoma.” Someone said across from where I was lying.

The voice belonged to the guy who kidnapped us for Ares. But when I looked at him, he looked nothing like a kidnapper. He looked more like an Olympic runner in his late twenties-early thirties. He had on nylon running shorts and a New York City Marathon T-shirt that I thought looked out of place considering we were miles away from New York City. And his black, curly hair and crooked smile gave his face that mischievous look that I had seen on Travis and Connor Stoll. Instantly I knew that this was Hermes. And instantly I knew that if Travis and Connor were bad, then their father was probably worse.

“ We’re going to Yuba City?” I said, my brain finally starting to work again. “ But that’s on the other side of the country! It will take us more than two days to get back to where we were! I don’t have that long to live and I would like to be rid of a curse before I die!”

“ Well, you’re lucky that I’m around. As for why you’re going to Yuba City, Ares wanted Karla over here to do something for him and he wanted to tell her personally for some strange reason. You other three just so happened to get dragged into it thanks to you.”

I knew it. We had gone from bad to worse.

“ So we get kidnapped by the god of thieves just to get dragged into some personal quest that the god of war wants his daughter to do. And no one but me seems to care that my life is the one in danger here because my insane ancestor’s ghost is trying to kill me like he has done to everyone in my family since the time of Pan.” I grumbled half to myself. “ Now I really do feel loved.”

“ Not everything revolves around you, wolf-boy.” Karla snapped.

“ Karla’s right, Lee.” John said, a faraway look on his face. “ Don’t you remember the prophecy?”

“ I only remember the line about the white wolf.” I said honestly, thinking back to when I heard the prophecy at dinner that time.

“ Here. I had Annabeth write this for us while you were in your daze that night.”

With that, he pulled a folded piece of paper from his bag. It was dirty and scrunched up like it had been pushed to the bottom of his bag. But other than that, it looked like it had never been opened since it was written. Carefully I sat myself up and took the piece of paper from him. Then I carefully unfolded it and read:

_Four will travel on this quest of wills,_

_The white wolf's blood shall boil and spill._

_To love or hate is ones demand,_

_And bow down to that which is unplanned._

_A musician shall appear and guide them through the falls,_

_And tame the beast through the mother's calls._

_But there shall be no hope for the ray of the sun,_

_When the final battle of the cursed is won._

I read it about ten times, still not able to comprehend what had been written or work out what it meant. I even turned the piece of paper every which way trying to figure out what it meant. But something in the back of my mind was telling me that the second line of the prophecy was still to be fulfilled. What happened back at the wolf’s den, what happened to my father, was not what the prophecy meant. I guess my dad’s brown fur did matter.

“ Prophecies. They’re a bugger, aren’t they?” Hermes said, breaking me from my thoughts.

“ Lord Hermes?” I practically begged him to explain. To be honest, I had completely forgotten that he was on the train with us.

“ They are never clear and to the point. John let me have a read while you were still unconscious and it’s got even me confused.”

Judging by the look that John was giving Hermes out of the corner of his eye, I would say that the god of thieves read the prophecy without consent. And as much as any one of us would have liked to tell him off for it, we couldn’t. He was a god and he was the expert at doing stuff like that. He’s also the god of speed. We stood no chance against him. But when I looked at the prophecy again for the eleventh time, my eyes fell on the second last line.

_But there shall be no hope for the ray of the sun,_

I felt my heart skip a beat as I realised what both Karla and John had meant. John’s father was Apollo and Apollo was the sun god which meant that John, and the rest of Apollo’s children, could be considered sun rays. And John was the only child of Apollo on this quest, unless someone was playing a trick and not telling me something which I highly doubt. That feeling of dread that had been engulfing my soul when this quest started suddenly returned with a vengeance and my throat closed in on itself when I realised that something bad was going to happen to my best friend.

Only now was I beginning to understand what my father and grandfather kept saying about love being life and hate being death and how life and death are one and the same. And to be honest, I did not like it one bit. I was scared. I probably went into shock again because the paper slipped from my hands and John was calling out to me and trying to get me to breathe.

 _No._ I thought to myself over and over again, trying to deny the fates.

 _Interesting. Yes._ Lysias’s voice echoed in my head. _Yes, I will have fun with this._

_You stay away from him! GOT THAT?!_

Lysias merely laughed in his evil wolfish way.

Karla, however, was not pleased with me not co-operating with them and calming down. Let me tell you now. The quickest way to snap a guy out of shock, at least in Karla’s books, is to knock some sense into them. She turned me around so fast that when she back-handed me, I was already coming out of it. So I felt the full force of the sting right on my jaw. I don’t think my jaw would ever be the same again.

“ Did you honestly have to do that?” I growled, rubbing my now stinging jaw and glaring at the daughter of Ares.

“ Yes I did.” She replied curtly.

“ You were slowly turning blue. We had to do something.” John said.

“ You even had me worried. I’m not the god of medicine, you know. That’s Apollo’s job.” Hermes added.

Then someone’s phone went off. I didn’t take much notice of it at first…until I realised that Hermes was yelling into his mobile phone about some titan guy holding up the sky and wanting that new grey business suit being shown on TV as well as wanting to change some pink tie he had for a blue one to match the suit.

I also caught something about piles of letters to the dead stacking up and needing to be sent down to Hades before some room burst open and Demeter wanting those cereal boxes and top Olympian soil fertilizer she ordered to be at her palace some time before breakfast so that she and her plants both have something to eat. I also think that the reminder of both Ares and some minor goddess being on lines two and three didn’t help the situation because Hermes looked like he was about to throw his phone.

“ Tell Ares that I’ve gotten them on the train to Yuba City already. I’m just trying to explain what’s going on to the cursed demigod. And make sure he knows that I’m not going to just ditch them like he would. As for Penia, for the last time tell her that I do not have anything to give to the poor!” the god practically yelled.

Thank the gods we were the only ones in the carriage. The next thing we knew was that Hermes had taken a deep breath and was shaking his head, a slight smile tweaking at his lips. Apparently Apollo was on line four and he was trying to get his brother to meet him at some concert in Connecticut. John, Karla, Glade and I each shared the same thought on that and it made a slight blush rush through John’s neck and up to his ears.

“ Looks like I’ve got to go, kids.” Hermes said after a particularly desperate plea from John’s father. “ Apollo’s not going to let me rest unless I go see him. Sorry I couldn’t explain things like I wanted to. And sorry for the kidnap.”

With that, and a bright flash that made us look away lest we were killed, Hermes disappeared. Once we were sure that it was safe to look, I took out the scroll tubes. The first one read ‘ _Location of the White Wolf.’_ That was obviously the one we needed. The second read ‘ _Spare Supply of Poison for the Death of the White Wolf.’_ My only guess was that there was no scroll in the second tube.

The third and final tube read ‘ _Letter of Apology to the Gods.’_ Wait. We were just with a god. In fact we were just with the god of messengers. I had the perfect opportunity to give the gods their apology and I didn’t even know. There must have been a reason for that. I opened the first scroll and started reading. Maybe there was something that I needed to know about the apology somewhere in the location of the white wolf.

“ Is that Greek?” Karla asked, looking over my shoulder.

“ You have a problem with me reading and speaking Greek?” I replied, not looking up from the letter.

“ No. You’re just full of surprises, Wolf-boy.”

“ What’s it say?” John asked.

“ It’s just saying that we need to go to Yellowstone National Park in order to meet Lysias personally and kill him. It’s also telling me random blubbering that my grandfather decided he needed to write down and telling me that I needed to sign an apology to the gods over my ancestors’ behaviours.” I replied before asking. “ Why are we even going to Yuba City, anyway?”

“ Remember that score I said I had to settle?” Karla asked.

“ Yeah.”

“ Well…”


	19. So Close, Yet So Far

Yuba City was dark when we finally got off the train. And Hermes had thought of everything. Literally. He left behind various fake licenses that excused Karla, John and Glade from doing things, documentations for me when I was a wolf, fake drivers licenses for me, John and Karla (which nearly gave the others a heart-attack when they saw mine), more bandages and other medical stuff (he just had this feeling that we were going to need more than what we already had), more mortal money, a white cane, a pair of crutches, a pair of sunnies and a guide dog harness. I got the feeling he had put his thieving skills to the test again.

Because I was a wolf at the time the train was nearing our station, John and Karla somehow managed to put the guide dog harness on me without hurting me even more. The crutches were obviously for Glade because they were just the right height for him. The sun glasses, on the other hand, were another story. Karla didn’t want to be seen with me as her ‘guide dog’ and John kept on worrying about everything. Glade was searching through the fake licenses and documents for anything that would sort out the argument. I could do nothing.

“ I refuse to be seen walking around my home town with a guide dog! There are a lot of people who probably still remember me and my brother. They would know that this is a lie!” Karla growled.

She had a good argument, however… “ Being a child of Ares means that not many would forget the ‘brat kids from down the street’. The next thing we know, there’ll be monsters after us like there was no tomorrow. If you put the sunnies on, then you won’t be recognised as easily.” And I complain about _me_ not keeping my mouth shut.

“ You call me a brat one more time, Smith, and I swear on Hades’ underwear…”

 _To tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?_ I said, earning looks from all three of them. I’m sorry. I couldn’t help it.

“ Okay…” Glade said slowly after a minute of intense silence.

He decided it was best to continue his search. Meanwhile, if looks could kill I would probably be dead a thousand times or more by both John and Karla. It wasn’t a very comfortable feeling. And that, my dear friends, is the problem with photographic memories. You can remember things at the most inappropriate times. It was a few more minutes before John and Karla decided that I had received enough mental daggers from them and continued their arguing. This time it was stopped when Glade yelled excitedly, jumping up and down and waving a piece of paper in his hands.

“ John! Put on the glasses!” He ordered, waving the paper in our faces and otherwise making it so that we couldn’t read it anyway.

“ What? Why? Karla should-” John began, stepping away from the crazy satyr.

“ It says it right here,” Glade was poking at the poor page and threatening to tear a hole through it. “ _‘This good tempered, German Shepherd Cross, Lee, has been officially claimed as the assistant guide dog of a Mr John Aaron Smith. Whosoever harms either dog or handler, or hence forth distracts the dog from its duties, shall suffer severe persecution under the jurisdiction of the Olympian Counsel.’_ Wow. Lord Hermes must really be looking out for you. Anyway, put those sunglasses on, John. Karla, get the bags.”

“ Don’t tell me what to do, midget!” Karla barked.

Never before had I seen Glade that angry. If there was an angry skin tone label for black and shadowy, I swear on my short, miserable life that he had accomplished it. The blackness in his almost pupil-less eyes made the fur on the back of my neck stand on end. His voice was like steel; cold and uncaring. It sent a chill down my spine. John obviously felt the same way I did because he froze where he stood.

“ Don’t call me ‘midget’.” The satyr bleated angrily.

After a few seconds of intense, uncomfortable silence in which I was sure Glade was throwing mental poisoned daggers at the daughter of Ares, Glade finally turned away and placed the documents and things into his pack. Then he put his pack on his back and got into his crutches. John and I merely looked at each other. Who knew he was that dark?

Finally the train came to a stop and John took hold of the guide dog harness. He had his sunglasses on and had shouldered his own backpack. Karla, grumbling to herself, took both bags that were left. When the doors opened, she led us out of the station and towards a nearby backpackers hotel. However three demigods and a satyr with the scent of a god still lingering around them did not go unnoticed.

As I led John out of the station, I caught the scent of monster perfume. Sitting at a table in the outdoor part of a street café were six old ladies. One was caressing a tawny coloured cat with golden eyes that screamed riddle maker. Two more had three large Newfoundland dogs at their feet watching me intently. One of the dogs even looked like it had a glint of revenge in its eyes. Without thinking, I stopped and started to growl at the small group.

“ What’s wrong, Lee?” John asked, also stopping.

 _Something’s not right._ I replied softly, hoping that the mist hid my voice. _Do you have your dagger on you?_

“ You know I prefer my bow.”

_Yeah. But something tells me that this matter is going to need close range. Remember, there are people around._

“ I still prefer the bow.”

_Yeah, okay. I get it._

“ What’s wrong, John?” Glade asked, limping up to us as Karla turned around.

 _Do you have your crowbar? Or your club?_ I asked him, this time in full wolf talk.

“ Why would I not?” A few seconds passed before he added. “ Okay, I lost the crowbar in Canada. Sorry.”

_No need to be. It fulfilled its purpose._

“ Maybe so, but it was still tasty. And I’m really not liking the way those old ladies are looking at us. Especially the… _cat_.”

“ What is going on over here?” Karla growled once she was by our side.

_Get out your sword. We’re going to be fighting._

Just as I said this, the dogs began barking and… growing? Oh, great. The tallest one of the three was an old friend of mine. Assassin was back and he wanted revenge. For some strange reason, I began wondering how the rest of the campers would react if I decided to tame him and bring him home with me. He was huge compared to Mrs O’Leary, so they probably would have been shit scared and tried to kill him… again.

Beside him, his two buddies were looking up at him as if waiting for some kind of signal from him to attack us. I figured Assassin was an alpha male with the way that these two smaller hellhounds were acting towards him. But apparently not even his pack members realised that the tawny cat was actually part lion.

Yeah. I know what you’re thinking. How can a cat be part lion? Let me tell you, it’s not the distant cousin kind of relation. This cat really was part lion. It jumped out of the old lady’s lap and stared at us. And this time its face was not that of a cat’s. It was more humanoid shaped with human lips and cheeks and such, but its nose was more like a big cat’s. And it was clear that it was a female.

“ Sphinx.” I heard Karla curse under her breath.

Only one thing buzzed through my mind then. Sphinx equals riddles. Riddles equal fun. When do we get started? But then my eyes shifted back to the six old ladies that were still sitting at the table having cups of tea. Only now they weren’t old ladies. And their tea was getting cold. The old ladies were standing now… on two thick snake legs.

 _Oh, no. Not them!_ I whimpered.

“ What are those things?” John asked.

For a minute there I had forgotten that he had nearly been strangled to death by a snake woman with one snake leg. He hadn’t seen the twin two snake legged women coming after us. He didn’t stop thinking that they would come back to get him.

_My worst nightmare. Snake women._

_Your_ worst _nightmare, Lysias?_ The torturous ghost was back.

 _I have many worst nightmares._ I told him. _Now, leave me alone._

Thankfully he did not continue. He merely laughed his creepy laugh and left my mind… for now. But I knew he would be back. Just not sooner than expected.

“ _Dracanae_.” Karla growled once more under her breath.

 _Okay, who’s getting who because I want to go up against the sphinx and the big hellhound wants my blood?_ I asked.

“ Forget shares. Just attack.”

Karla raised her sword, John got out his dagger, Glade took his club from his side… and I calculated the distance from us to the nearest alley. If we could get in an alleyway, then the monsters would follow us and the mortals wouldn’t get hurt or realise what was happening. It would also mean that we had a better chance of not getting surrounded. And the mortals wouldn’t think we were just randomly killing old women. I quickly glanced up at Karla and noticed that she was about to lead the other two into an attack. Unfortunately, the sphinx seemed to have other plans.

“ Oh no, godlings. Did you think I would fight when there is an opportunity to test your knowledge? No. Riddles will be my battle. Now, step forth riddle solver.” She said in a teacher-like tone, ruffling her wings slightly. (I think I forgot to mention those earlier.)

“ Not fair, s-s-sphinx.” One of the _dracanae_ hissed.

It must have been stupid because I saw how fair it was. One of us was distracted with riddles while the rest fought for their lives against nine other monsters. Apparently the sphinx thought the same because she snarled at the snake woman, flicked her tail in annoyance and turned to face us again. And the look on her face told me that she didn’t like waiting.

“ Fine. Two of you will answer two of my riddles.” The sphinx growled.

 _I’ll do it._ I said instantly.

“ You sure?” Glade asked quietly.

_Are you doubting the power of Athena?_

“ No.”

“ So will I.” John added, responding to the sphinx.

“ Excellent.” The sphinx purred. It reminded me of an evil villain… which she pretty much was, but you get the idea. “ Listen carefully for I will not repeat. You lose and you die, but I lose and I retreat.”

“ _Understood._ ” John and I replied in unison.

“ Very well… riddle one;

What does man love more than life,

Fear more than death or mortal strife-

What the poor have, the rich require,

And what contented me desire;

What misers spend, and spendthrifts save,

And all men carry to the grave?

The first to accept is the first to answer.”

I thought for a moment. I had read that exact riddle somewhere before, but I wasn’t sure where though. Maybe it was from one of my dad’s books or maybe one of my own. Subconsciously my head pointed towards the ground slightly as I replayed the riddle in my head. Images of my father’s and grandfather’s graves flashed in my mind and I realised that I was alone. I don’t know what brought those images forward, but they helped me with the answer.

 _Nothing._ I said, shaking my head and looking the sphinx in the eye. _The answer is nothing._

“ You are correct.” Came her reply. She didn’t look happy about it, but she let it pass and turned her gaze to John. “ Riddle two;

As I was going to St. Ives,

I met a man with seven wives.

Each wife had seven sacks;

Each sack had seven cats;

Each cat had seven kits.

Kits, cats, sacks, wives-

How many were going to St. Ives?

What is your answer son of the sun god?”

One thing that creeps me out about monsters is that once you’re claimed, they seem to know everything about you. Or in my case once some silver owl or other sign from Athena shows itself to you, they know who you are. It just proves that they stalk demigods. But when I looked up at John, I could see that he was having troubles with solving the riddle.

It took him longer to answer than I did with my riddle and the sphinx was getting impatient. And if I knew my history, an impatient sphinx usually meant a hungry sphinx. Personally, I did not like the image of my best friend being eaten by a winged lion with the head of a female human. I wanted so badly to yell out the answer for him. Or even just whisper the word to him. But I was afraid that the sphinx had super hearing or something. I had to think of another way to get the message across. Then my eyes landed on Glade.

 _Glade. Help me help John. Mutter answers so he can hear you. And put emphasis on ‘one’. I do not want to see him become a midnight snack._ I said in wolf talk, hoping that none of the monsters would understand.

I was about to say something when John blurted out the answer on his own.

“ One.” He said.

The sphinx let loose a heavy sigh before she spread her wings. “ You have answered correctly, son of Apollo. Any later and you would have made a nice meal. Both riddles have been asked and answered correctly. I shall now take my leave.”

And with that, she took off into the night sky… leaving her buddies behind to fight over us. Karla saw that as her cue to charge. Assassin had the same idea as her. He leapt, sailed over the daughter of Ares and landed right in front of me. John put his dagger away and took out his bow, ready to take down the _dracanae_ and smaller hellhounds.

Within a matter of seconds, the street had become a battlefield. Glade was more than happy to pound the living daylights out of the monsters, especially one of the hellhounds that decided to have goat for dinner. The other hellhound didn’t last long. It took one step towards Karla before being turned into a pile of dust with help from her sword. My guess was that Karla’s dagger was only, and forever shall be, a backup weapon in case she didn’t have her sword in hand for some reason. If she was badass with the dagger, she was murderous with the sword.

Three of the _dracanae_ went down easily after that. All three, like the hellhound before them, were victims of Karla. The other three met their end at John’s arrows. Glade was still pounding the living daylights out of his hellhound… until the genius managed to get himself flung into the nearest alleyway where we heard a rather nasty clatter of trash cans. For the first time that day, or any day I think, John and Karla were working together. An arrow pierced its skull and a sword point found its chest. That hellhound didn’t stand a chance.

“ Smith! Find the satyr! Wolf-boy and I can handle this big guy!” Karla growled.

 _No! He’s mine!_ I snarled in reply as John ran off to find Glade.

Let’s back up here. While all that was going on, Assassin and I were having a standoff. He was wary of me thanks to what had happened the last time we had met. I was trying to figure out why he looked bigger than last time. It turned out to be my eyes playing tricks on my mind. He hadn’t grown. I had shrunk. This is what happens when you go from being a 5 foot 6 human to a 34 inch wolf. And neither one of us had moved by the time the last of Assassin’s buddies had met their end to Karla and John.

“ Well, hurry it up!” Karla snapped.

Assassin obliged. He leapt at me… but didn’t expect me to dash under him before he was able to sink his teeth into me. Before he had even realised what had happened and turned around, I had called _Kleitos_ out. It probably looked weird seeing a wolf wearing a guide dog harness and holding a bronze double-bladed pole-arm in its mouth, but thankfully Karla didn’t say anything… yet. I was almost sure that she was going to say something later.

But I had strained myself. Pain was streaming through my body and blood was pouring out of my shoulder. I hadn’t done anything except run for safety and already the wound in my shoulder had re-opened. Not even the padding that was between the wound and the harness could do anything. I had to end it now, or else it was too late.

The large hellhound in front of me didn’t help, either. He didn’t want to move because I now had a sharp weapon in my mouth. I didn’t want to move because I didn’t want to strain myself even further. Karla didn’t move because she wasn’t allowed to interfere, though she was grumbling about it and glaring at me. And in the distance, getting closer as we stared each other down, I heard sirens. They didn’t sound friendly either.

“ Lee, come on!” Karla growled, finally hearing the sirens herself.

It was the first time she called me by my name. But I was in too much pain to even register it. Assassin sensed it and he took it to his advantage. With a malicious gleam in his eyes, he leapt at me again. Somehow I managed to move my head so that _Kleitos_ cut across his chest. A few seconds later, and with an expression on his face that clearly stated ‘you’ll pay, pup’, my buddy decided he was needed back in Tartarus. Then, with a yelp of pain, I fell on my side, _Kleitos_ returning to its place on my wrist.

“ _Skata._ ” I heard Karla swear under her breath in Greek as she sheathed her sword and rushed to my side. “ Where’s Smith when you need him?”

By this time, the cops were literally just around the corner. Karla was struggling with the harness, trying to get it off me to try and lessen the pain. I was trying to keep myself from blacking out for fear of being under Lysias’s mercy again. The last thing I needed was some other part of me being torn out or severely injured.

But the only thing I could think about was what had been so terrible that Ares had wanted Karla to do his dirty work? Why was Karla’s step-father under eternal damnation at the hands of the war god? Why had Ares told his own daughter that her step-father already had a place reserved for him in the Fields of Punishment? Why was I thinking about these things as I was going in and out of consciousness? At least we were closer to Yellowstone than when we were in Canada. It was only a few states over in the north-east direction. There was nothing major to worry about… except the fact that Karla and I were getting arrested by the police. Was it even possible to arrest a wolf? I fainted again before I could find the answers.


	20. Of Jail Cells And Hidden Emotions

I was glad that I no longer had the guide dog harness on when I woke up. Karla was screaming out of the cell, ordering bandages be brought in for me. And, of course, our packs had been taken off us. I was in a daze, lying on my uninjured side under the window with the sun streaming through the bars and into the cell. The pain from having transformed clogged my mind, but something didn’t seem right. And it seemed like only I could tell.

She was finally heard after about fifteen minutes of her screaming her lungs out. And when the guard finally came to see what she was ‘squawking about’, I had my eyes half closed and a small pool of sick had gathered under my mouth.

I think I must have dropped into unconsciousness because the next thing I knew was that Karla was at my side and dripping Nectar into my mouth. Apparently the guard had brought her my bag as soon as she told him that my medicine was in there but she didn’t know how to describe what it looked like. In other words, she forced him to bring her my bag.

“ Where…?” I asked, my voice slurred and full of pain.

“ In jail.” Karla replied before I could finish. “ Some idiot decided to call the cops when they saw that we had killed those monsters. You’re lucky, though. They saw your shoulder and were going to shoot you, but I stopped them.”

“ Thanks.”

“ Don’t. We’re still in jail. I’m still trying to get us out and I can’t do that with you being sick and fainting on me, you know.”

I remained silent. It had suddenly dawned on me that I was alone in a room, albeit in prison, and with the girl I had a crush on ever since the first morning I had consciously transformed at camp. Suddenly, all the pain I was in vanished. My mind was still buzzing, but it was full of pros and cons of being in a jail cell with Karla. And once again, I found myself staring straight into her eyes as she tried to get me up so she can check my shoulder.

They were soft, like she was remembering something from her past. But as soon as she caught me, the softness disappeared instantly. It was obviously a touchy subject. With a sigh I forced myself to look away and I somehow managed to take off my shirt without hurting myself further. Well, I pulled it up over my head and made it so that there was no fabric on or near the wounded shoulder. Karla ended up completely taking it off so that it wasn’t in the way of her working on my shoulder.

Somehow I resisted the urge to scream in pain as Karla unravelled the bandages. But it still hurt like crazy. Unfortunately, that was the easy part. The hard part was cleaning and redressing the wound. That part, I had no doubt in my mind, was going to be painful. But then Karla cursed out loud, in English, at the sight of my shoulder.

“ I think I’m going to be sick.” She muttered. I felt a small tug in my stomach as she said that.

“ I know I’m going to be sick if you don’t hurry up.” I replied.

“ I have no idea what I’m doing. Where’s Smith when you need him?”

“ Not in a jail cell.”

“ Just shut up, wolf-boy!”

I did. But only because my stomach felt like it was about to betray me. In reality I would have debated it. Talking was keeping my mind busy. And with my mind busy, the pain couldn’t get in. Unfortunately, the pain had to escalate when Karla poured water over the gaping wound in my shoulder. My mind was completely over-ridden with pain. By the time she poured some nectar over it in an attempt to get it to heal, I was screaming my head off.

“ Are you trying to kill me, because if that’s what you’re doing, you’re definitely succeeding?!” I screamed after a few minutes of not being able to do anything else.

“ I am trying to help!” Karla snapped back.

“ And that comes out of the mouth of an Ares child.” I muttered… only to get slapped upside the head by said Ares child.

“ Shut up, Wolf-boy. You only have four days left to live, by your word. I can shorten that, you know.”

I took the hint. But that still didn’t stop the pain from buzzing through my mind and a groan from escaping my lips as I tried to sit up. I had closed my eyes as I was getting up, and when I opened them I found Karla soaking the bandages in a bowl of water in an attempt to clean them. Apparently she had asked for a bowl as well when she asked for my bag. Unfortunately, we had to reuse the bandages that we had with us.

Now I know what you’re thinking, why didn’t we thinking of that in the first place? Let me tell you. We did. But John had decided that we had to change them regularly due to how much worse my wounds were getting. I couldn’t object. Then again, I probably wouldn’t have considering the amount of pain that I was in.

But something seemed wrong. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that my arm was slowly turning blue. I knew for a fact that a blue arm was generally not a good sign. Unless, of course you were some blue giant of the north or had naturally blue skin, but somehow I don’t think I was like that. Gingerly I moved my arm, thinking that it was just the angle it was in. Bad move. Pain erupted through my body like a bomb had gone off.

“ I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Karla muttered.

“ What?” I asked dumbly. My mind was being overrun with pain so it wasn’t functioning properly.

“ I said I wouldn’t do that. Gods, are you dumb? Even I know that you could make an injury like that worse if you move it.” Then I heard her mutter under her breath, “ And I thought all Athenians were supposed to be smart.”

Once again my anger was sparked. “ For your information, I can’t think clearly when I’m in pain! No man can!”

“ Well… tough it…” Karla’s voice died away. She sighed and then began muttering almost to herself. “ What’s the point? You need anti-venom.”

“ Karla?” I asked cautiously.

I have never seen her like this before even though I’d only known her for what? Nearly two weeks? About there, yeah. Anyway, when she was around others, especially around her cabin mates, she was tough and bossy. A stereotypical Ares child. But now that she was alone, she seemed almost scared. It was like she had been wearing a mask that I had slowly been urging off. At least, I thought it was because of me considering everyone thought she was nearly as tough as Clarisse la Rue.

“ You’ve been poisoned.” She said softly like the word was her own, personal poison.

“ Poisoned?” I replied weakly, my heart pounding in my chest.

“ That’s what I said, dim-wit.”

Instantly memories flashed into my head of my father telling me stories of my ancestors. More specifically, the stories of some of my ancestors who had been poisoned by Lysias. It was said that he had given them a set number of days to live and wounded them in some way. And by the time the final day had arrived, down to the last minute, the poisoned victim of Lysias had died… slowly and painfully. None had survived.

As I realised that that was exactly what was happening to me, I felt all colour drain from my face. That, for some reason, made Karla worried. She looked like she was about to panic. And the only thing I could think about was that I had to get to Yellowstone National Park within the next four days and kill my insane ancestor before I died.

Once again, my mind travelled to back on the train when Karla had explained what Ares had wanted her to do. I still didn’t understand it. But I didn’t think now would be the best time to mention anything. Karla was leading me down a new trail that I had no idea existed. And I didn’t want to lose my guide.

“ Poison.” I mumbled to myself, trying to work something out in my brain that I didn’t have all the pieces to.

“ Apparently it’s gotten to your brain.” Karla grumbled, but I could sense the fear in her voice.

“ Let’s hope it hasn’t, because if it has then I wouldn’t have four days left to live.”

“ What?”

“ One of Lysias’s specialties was poison. He would wound the victim severely, making it so that there was an opening to the bloodstream, then he would poison them without them knowing. Only after he gave them a set date of their death did some of the later generations realise what was happening. Eventually it became branded in our bloodstream to fear the words ‘you’ve been poisoned’.”

“ You seem pretty calm about it now, though.”

“ What’s one of the first signs of fear?”

“ I don’t know… loss of colour or something like that, right?”

“ Yeah. And that’s exactly what happened, remember?”

Karla nodded, signalling that she had heard me, but her jaw was set as if she was either trying to remember something or someone. And it was then that I realised that this now fallen mask that she had worn was making me worry about her myself. It almost sent me into more of a panic than I already was… and I did not want that.

I looked down at my blue-tinted arm. It was hard to believe that I was going to die like so many of my ancestors. And after everything that I had been through, I was not about to let that happen. Even if I had to amputate my own arm off. I must have been thinking too much about my sword because the next thing I knew was that Karla must have guessed what I was planning on doing and was trying to get me to put _Kleitos_ away.

“ Doing that won’t help you, you know. If what you’re saying is true, then the source of the poison will be in your wound. And unless you want to split yourself in half, then I wouldn’t do that.” She said, her voice emotionless.

Reluctantly I returned _Kleitos_ to my wrist and looked up at her. Her red brown eyes held that puppy dog look that she got when she was thinking about something. But I couldn’t help but notice that she was checking me out. It probably didn’t help that I was still shirtless despite being in pain. I guess she was thinking about the pros and cons of being alone in a jail cell with me as well. And there was no surprise that I found it slightly disturbing and shifted slightly to try and get myself away from her gaze.

She must have realised what she was doing because her eyes hardened slightly and she turned back to the bandages that were soaking in the bowl. I had been so worked up about the poison that I had forgotten that the wound was still exposed to open air. And the realisation stung big time. Even more so when Karla drained the excess water from the bandages and began to rewrap my shoulder. I chose then to declare the dressing of my wound in that cell punishment for everything that happened from the time I entered to the time I left.

To keep my mind off the pain, I decided that I needed to figure out some things. I still didn’t fully understand why Ares would interrupt a hero’s quest for his own. Nor did I understand what Karla’s step-father had to do with all this. And I was willing to bet with the entire Hermes cabin and Hermes himself that I would also find out the reason behind the fear that Karla had been showing earlier.

“ Remind me again why we are locked in a jail cell in Yuba City.” I groaned through the pain that raked through my body.

“ Because when Ares tells you to do something, you do it.” Karla replied, her voice practically freezing.

“ Besides that fact. Didn’t he know that we were already on a quest? In fact, aren’t the gods supposed to leave heroes alone if they are already on a quest?”

A crash of thunder told me not to get on Ares’s bad side.

I sent a silent prayer to Athena, begging her to make sure my last days on Earth were as pleasant as could be considering my lunatic ancestor had poisoned me.

“ Rules are meant to be broken, aren’t they? Besides, they do help from time to time. Put it this way, we just need to steal another car and head to Yellowstone and we should be there within the day.” Karla replied, the hint of her old growl in her voice.

“ Okay. But that still doesn’t really answer my question.”

“ I already told you. I have to punish my step-father for what he did to my mother. Emmett would have done it if he wasn’t occupied with… stuff back at camp, the idiot.”

“ For what?”

“ He…That would be personal.”

Okay… that plan flew out the window. “ Listen. If he did anything to hurt you in anyway, I want to know so that I can personally rip his throat out.”

The words were out of my mouth before I had even known what I was saying. And, to be honest, I was glad that Karla had not long finished rewrapping my wound otherwise I would be finding it hard to breathe. We both just froze. Then, after what felt like an eternity of awkward silence, I felt my face and neck begin to burn.

“ What?” Karla growled slowly.

“ I… I…” I was silently cursing my ADHD moment.

“ Spit it out, Wolf-boy!”

“ I… I… don’t want anyone hurting my… my friends.”

“ I wasn’t the one hurt, stupid!” Safe. For now.

“ Well, I’m sorry.”

But Karla didn’t seem to notice that I had responded. She was back in her memories again; that puppy-dog look in her eyes once more. I honestly hadn’t meant to get her so worked up like that. But I guess it all just came running out. Sort of like my awkward ADHD moment. I was still trying to figure out where that came from when her now soft voice spoke again.

“ It was my mother.” She practically whispered.

“ Your… I… I didn’t know. I didn’t mean to…” I stuttered, realising this was what Karla was hiding.

But she kept going. “ He poisoned her and killed her. And my father wants me to do the same thing to him. Exactly the same thing. But we don’t have a snake.”

“ We don’t need a snake.” I said quietly, thinking about the second scroll tube that was shot out at me by my grandfather’s headstone.

“ What?” She asked, seemingly realising that I was still there.

“ We have a bow. We have arrows. And we have poison. But I want nothing to do with the actual deed itself. And you only get one arrow. Got it?”

“ No.” There was a few seconds of awkward silence before, “ WHY ARE YOU HELPING ME?”

I thought my ears were going to burst with how loud she was screaming in them. To be honest, if she had screamed any louder I actually think at least one of my ear drums would have burst. Thankfully nothing like that happened, except I instantly got a splitting headache to add onto my burning shoulder. One of these days I am going to learn to keep my mouth shut.

“ Because that’s what friends do.” I replied, though my voice was a lot softer than hers.

“ We’re not friends.” She growled, but I got the feeling that she didn’t mean it. “ I only joined this quest because I have a job to do.”

“ Whatever you say, Townsend.”

But at that moment I got the feeling that I needed to move away from the wall. I don’t know what it was that forced me to move, and I don’t think I’ll ever know (in all honesty, I think it was the sense of impending doom that the majority of people and animals have) but I grabbed my shirt and struggled to put it on without hurting myself further. Karla was looking at me like I was some kind of stupid enemy that was oblivious to the fact that certain death was seconds away from finding my gut. She was about to force me back to the ground when a strangely familiar and slightly crazy sounding voice rang out from the other side of the wall.

“ Drop and roll!”


	21. A Jailbreak... Of The Explosive Kind

“ You idiot! I’m never giving you chocolate again! Even if it is allergy free!” A second voice yelled out, seconds later.

“ Aw, come on! Aren’t you supposed to warn people before you blow something up?” the first voice whined.

It sounded suspiciously like Glade and I wondered what exactly those two had been doing while Karla and I were stuck in jail. But I was mainly worried for my life to ponder that thought for very long. Both Karla and I had looked at each other in horror at the mention of blowing something up. And knowing my luck at the moment, that something would probably be me.

“ Well, yeah. But you’re not supposed to scream it out so that the gods can hear all the way on Olympus on the other side of the country!” the second voice, probably John, growled.

“ You’re not?” Glade asked, clearly high on something. He should know that.

“ Do you know anything about what we are doing?”

“ I know that you have to be away from the wall when the Greek fire explodes.”

“ You’re using Greek fire!?” Karla practically roared as she threw my bag against the cell door.

“ How else are we supposed to get you out?” Glade called from the other side of the wall.

“ I don’t know… maybe use the front door!”

“ She’s right, you know Glade. We could have just snuck in, knocked the guards out, taken the keys and let them out that way. But someone wanted to blow something up. The Fourth of July fireworks don’t start until four days from now.”

“ Well that’s just fine and dandy!” I growled, sarcasm dripping in my voice and my hands flailing in the air with frustration.

“ What’s your problem?” Karla asked me.

“ I’ve probably been given the worst gift for my birthday that anyone, let alone my insane ancestor’s ghost, can give me. I’m going to die on my birthday underneath a firework filled sky. Never thought that could happen… then again I never thought my life could happen.”

“ You can’t be serious.”

“ If I wasn’t what would you say?”

“ Your birthday is on the Fourth of July?”

“ Got a problem with that? Because my uncle was born on Christmas day and my grandfather was born on New Year’s day.”

“ No. No problem here.”

I never thought I’d see the day that a child of Ares was left speechless. Usually they had some kind of snide remark or scary outburst that you needed to watch out for. Then again, I never expected to meet a child of Ares, thinking that they were all like their father. Boy, was I wrong. At least with Karla, I was. But before I could think about anything else to do with what was going to be happening four days from now, Karla had dragged me onto my feet and had moved me to the cell door… just as green smoke began pouring in from the window.

“ I hope you two are nowhere near the window, because this thing is about to blow.” John called seconds before the wall blew up and alarms began blaring.

Thank the gods Karla had dragged me away. There would be nothing left of me if she hadn’t. When the dust cleared, there was a nice big hole in the side of the jail where the back wall to our cell had been. However, my left side was facing the blast (Karla had dragged me by my right arm) and I didn’t have the chance to cover my ears so now blood and mucus was trickling down the left side of my face. Great. My injury list now read:

_1) Massive hole in left shoulder, going through bone at the same time. I seriously hate spiders. Especially large, hungry and angry ones._

_2) Splitting headache thanks to Karla._

_3) Poison… because my insane ancestor is a serious madman._

_4) Burst eardrum thanks to a chocolate-high Glade and his insistence on using explosive green substances known as Greek fire._

My balance wasn’t that good thanks to my recent injury, but somehow I managed to stumble out of the cell without too much trouble. Karla was right behind me, carrying my bag and looking murderous at John and Glade who were standing by the path waiting for us. _They_ had more room to manoeuvre than we did. _They_ were luckier than we were. _They_ were going to get an earful from Karla and they knew it.

“ You!” She growled, shoving her finger in John’s face. “ What took you so long? The poison is spreading! It’s covering the top of his shoulder and turning his arm blue! And because you weren’t there, I had to do everything! Including washing the old bandages!” The only thing John did was blink a couple of times in shock before the daughter of Ares practically punched Glade in the face. “ And you! You idiot! You-you son of a-a donkey! Why would you blow up a jail cell? Does the word inconspicuous mean anything to you?! You could have killed us! And while we’re on it, ‘drop and roll’? Did you somehow forget that Wolf-boy has a massive hole in his shoulder that prevents him from doing stuff like that?”

I never knew Karla cared... or had that kind of vocabulary considering. (And there I go with my stereotypes again.) But at that moment I was looking at Glade. His face was contorted in a mixture of confusion, fear and anger. The fear I could understand. The anger was probably due to the donkey insult (I guess satyrs don’t like being called donkeys). But the confusion I could only assume was from his currently high state of mind. Again I wondered what the two of them had been doing while Karla and I were locked up.

However, I quickly got bored of the yelling. Very slowly, so that my head didn’t go spinning and I didn’t lose what balance I still had, I turned my head to assess the damage. Aside from the giant hole where the wall of our cell should have been, the grass around it was either dead, disintegrated or squashed under broken bricks and iron bars. There was even the odd small flame still flickering on the grass that refused to go out.

And beyond the hole in the wall, I could just make out the alarms blaring and the prison guards trying to find the source of the problem. That was when I knew that we needed to get out of there. The problem was, the pain and disorientation combined to make my head spin and I staggered a bit where I stood. I reached out to my left to try and steady myself. It wasn’t until a few minutes later that I realised that it was Karla’s arm that I had grabbed.

“ Do you mind, Wolf-boy?” Karla growled loudly, but it was distant despite her being right next to me.

That confused me. And being a child of Athena, I instantly knew something was wrong. Usually you would notice straight away if you couldn’t hear something from a certain direction. For some strange reason it took me quite a few minutes. I hadn’t paid much attention because my right ear was right next to Karla screaming at John and Glade. But now that my left was in clear range of being yelled into, I couldn’t hear anything out of it… unless you counted some distant humming sound that is. One thing was clear, though. The blast had not only knocked my sense of balance, it also made me deaf in my left ear.

Slowly, my eyes half closed to try and prevent myself from getting dizzy again, I turned to face Karla. She looked like she was trying to figure out what was wrong with me as well as looking mad at me for grabbing hold of her to steady myself. It was clear that she was still angry at John and Glade, but the sight of me seemed to make her furious. With her eyes ablaze, she turned back to Glade and muttered a few choice words angrily at him. I couldn’t hear what she said, but judging by Glade’s now completely white face it must not have been good.

Out of the corner of my eye I noticed John mouthing the words ‘can you hear me?’, though I was pretty sure that he was actually saying them and I just couldn’t hear him say them. He looked worried when I looked back at him blankly, still trying to figure out exactly what had happened. But I knew, deep down I knew, Glade had gone and burst my eardrum for me. I was glad, though, that I wasn’t the one to be yelling at him.

John moved to my right side before asking, “ Can you hear anything at all from your left?”

“ No.” I replied, though my tongue had slipped into Greek. It came out like “ Ochi.”

Thank the Gods they understood.

“ What about pain?”

“ I’m in so much pain, I can’t even tell where it’s coming from anymore.”

My sentence, though in Greek and slightly slurred, seemed to knock the wind out of me. In fact, it sent my head spinning and I nearly did a comical fall in the process. I got about half-way before John and Karla grabbed hold of me and steadied me. And, even though there were a lot of thoughts running through my head about my current situation, only one stuck out. Why were we still standing there when the police were after us?

“ We need to leave.” I grumbled, blinking away the dizziness. My grumble was almost loud enough to be considered a yell. I blamed my lack of hearing.

“ First, I think we need to do something about your ear.” John said to my right as I watched Karla’s lips form a string of words that I couldn’t make out to my left.

Okay, I lie. I could make out ‘wolf-boy’, but that was about it. But then I noticed the policemen inspecting the jail cells and realised that we didn’t have time. Every muscle in my body was tingling, urging me to run for my life. Every hair on my arms and the back of my neck rose as if sensing the danger I was in. The problem was convincing my friends and my brain that we needed to move.

“ No.” I managed to slur in Greek. “ We need to leave now. We don’t have time to spend our days in another prison. Run now, heal later.”

On saying this, I tried to run. It was an epic fail. I took two completely off balance steps backwards thinking I was going forwards, did a full circle turn as I tried to steady myself, did a sort of zombie shuffle off to the side towards Glade which ended in me rolling over myself and somehow managed to end up back on my feet despite the insane amount of pain I was in. It honestly felt like I was drunk or something. Probably looked like it, too.

What did I learn through this experience? Never try running when your head is busy acting like a spinning top, your body feels like it just got run over by a stampede of elephants and you feel like your world is a tight rope that you are crossing because you basically have no sense of balance. I got an earful from Karla (who had since realised that I could hear absolutely nothing from my left side) over it when she came over to me and grabbed me firmly by my right arm, claiming I was an idiot and a lot of other things that I tuned out on.

And that’s when the police decided to get the other’s minds into gear. “ Oi! What are you doing? Get back here!”

It was the guy that I had seen come to the cell door to try and shut Karla up. And Karla recognised him. Without a second thought, she wrapped my arm around her neck and practically dragged me down the road. John and Glade followed like they had some kind of angry wild animal after them. And behind them came the cops. I could honestly say that this was not the first time that I thought we weren’t going to make it out alive.


	22. Ares's Orders Completed

Ever felt like a sack of potatoes? I’ll tell you now. It doesn’t feel very good. Karla pulled me into the first bus she saw, pretty much barking at the driver to take us to the closest stop near a hotel. John and Glade barely had enough time to get on the bus before the doors closed. The cops (thank the gods) weren’t so lucky. They had to turn around and get a car before they could follow us, leaving us enough time to get ahead of them and into a hotel before they were able to find us and lock us up again.

All this time I was being rushed along, pushed into seats, knocked into people, growled at by Karla, forced to carry Glade on my lap (much to his distaste), and stared at by the other passengers. It was not fun. And having John practically on top of me and trying to assess the damage done to my ear didn’t help the feeling at all. For some strange reason, I felt like screaming out ‘Wanna-be doctor coming through! Make way if you value your life!’ but something tells me that John wouldn’t be too happy with it.

We eventually got kicked off the bus about two blocks away from a small motel like the ones that you see on the side of the road when you’re going on long road trips. It was two stories high and had a small garden bed on either side of the drive way. But considering we were on the run from the law, we didn’t have time to admire the slightly boring building. Karla hurried us to the receptionist office and out of sight of the road, dragging me in behind her. Once the door was closed, she forced me into the nearest chair.

“ Do you think…?” Glade began, cutting himself off in case anyone over heard.

“ We better be. I wouldn’t have run if… you know.” Karla growled as she shoved her thumb in my direction, but for some reason it didn’t seem threatening.

“ We all know you wouldn’t have run, but you had to.” John somehow managed to sigh despite being worked up and out of breath.

“ Well I didn’t want to get throw back in that place, now did I? I’ve got stuff I have to do!” Now she seemed threatening.

“ Guys. Stop.” I mumbled.

My voice surprised all four of us. I guess everyone was expecting it to be in slurred Greek or something like that. Instead it came out as slightly forced English, though it did have a bit of an accent when I said it. The words were faint in volume, but they were clear in the sense that they weren’t slurred. Almost immediately after I had said those two words, though, the room started tilting and trying to form a triangle with itself. And that in itself made my breath catch in my throat and I began finding it hard to breathe.

“ Maybe you shouldn’t talk, Lee.” John suggested as he hurried to help me.

I was still trying to regain my breath and work my head around an answer when a kindly old man walked into the room and behind the desk, muttering something about ‘voices’. At least, I assume it was one old man. My eyes were telling me that there was at least three of him. My only working ear, though, was telling me that there was only one voice, so I decided to go with that instead. It was the safer option.

“ Ah, children. Is everything okay? Did you need any help?” He said, but his voice was slightly distorted to my ear (he was standing in front of me and slightly to my left).

Karla must have said something about staying for a night because both John and the old man started arguing with her. I assume Glade was, too, but my head was making my stomach turn and my throat tighten. I had had to close my eyes in order to try and stop my head from spinning and my stomach from making its presence known. But something told both me and John that it wasn’t going to last.

As if on cue, I started heaving. John said something about me not being able to make it to the nearest bathroom in time and I managed to catch the sound of feet hurrying along the floor. There was a slight pressure on my back, forcing my head to rest on my knees, then something hit the floor in front of me. The pressure slowly turned into a faint but smooth, circular motion. After that, I don’t remember a thing.

What I do remember, though, is waking up in one of the motel rooms on my good side and with a small bucket beside my head. My vision was still a little blurry and when I looked at the nearby clock, all I saw was a jumble of red and black. But I was pretty sure that it was around midday if not early afternoon because I wasn’t a wolf. However I did hear the unmistakable bleats of Glade’s snoring, meaning the satyr had finally hit a sugar low and crashed out. All I could think about for that situation was ‘thank the gods’.

Then it hit me. I was lying with my right ear buried in the pillow under my head. How could I be hearing anything? My still clouded mind began working over time again, which ended up hurting and making what little of the blurred room I could see start spinning. It was like being on a merry-go-round, just without the ‘merry’ part. Finally, I somehow managed to come to the conclusion that John had poured nectar into my ear to try and heal it. It probably didn’t help (or maybe it did depending on how you saw it) that my left ear was tingling with fading pain from the deed. Whatever happened, I was glad to have some use of that ear back.

Either Glade must have been really close to me in his sleep or having chocolate made him snore even louder, but I had to strain my hearing in order to try and find where Karla and John were. There was also the possibility that they were talking softly if not talking at all. But, after a lot of straining on my part and a frustrated growl on Karla’s part, I managed to realise that John was giving Karla a quick 101 on how to use a bow and arrow without killing the intended target. I guess she must have been getting impatient with me and asked him.

In any case, idiot me decided that I needed to get up. My head went spinning so badly I was tempted to just crash back onto the pillow. Instead, I made it to the side of the bed and let loose my stomach contents. The burning relief that came afterward may not have tasted or looked very pleasing, but it did warn me of how sick I was getting. And for some strange and idiotic reason, I ignored it and was just relieved that I no longer had the feeling of throwing up. Of course, that could all change if my head decided it didn’t want me moving again.

After a few deep breaths, I somehow managed to get up off the bed and move over to the bathroom that was, thankfully, not that far away. Once I had managed to settle my head, which had begun spinning again when I got up, I rinsed out my mouth and washed my face. But one thing kept bugging me. The fact that I was getting sicker from the poison meant that my death was coming faster than anticipated. And that also made me worried for John’s life as the second last line of the prophecy returned to haunt my mind.

“ I don’t think it was a good idea to rat out our hiding place.” I turned off the water as the faint sound of John’s voice made its way into my ears, still slightly disorientating thanks to my still recovering ear.

“ I didn’t rat us out, idiot. I just made sure that he was in the area so I could do this thing.” The sure sound of Karla’s faint growl followed shortly after.

“ Are you even sure he’ll come?”

“ Of course I’m sure. He’s a DRC. We’re on the run, remember? They’ll do anything get me and wolf-boy back in the can for the apparent ‘murder of some old ladies and their pets’. And they’re after you and Glade because you were the one who set a lunatic satyr to blow up the side of their prison.”

“ Technically, I didn’t set him on the prison. He dragged me along.”

“ You gave him chocolate therefor it’s your fault.”

“ Whatever.”

I smiled weakly at the accusation before returning back to my bed. The room was still too busy spinning in front of me, so I couldn’t make out many distinguishing factors about the room. All I was sure about was that there were two sets of bunk beds, a TV, a back door that looked like it led to a small balcony where Karla and John were having a private lesson on archery, a small fold-up picnic table complete with four chairs, and a raven sitting on the table.

At first glance I didn’t take much notice of the bird, thinking that it was just a decoration in the room. Then it turned its head and rested its golden eyes on me. It seemed to realise how sick I really was and was looking like it was trying to work out the best way to keep me alive. But I wasn’t focussed on the expression. I was focussed on the fact that it had golden eyes. Ravens didn’t usually have golden eyes.

“ That’s him, right there.” I heard Karla whisper/yell from outside. “ Now do you believe me?”

“ I’m sorry, okay. I’m just…” John sounded a bit flustered when he answered.

“ Save it for later, Smith. We’ve got a poisoned arrow to shoot.”

“ Do you even have the poison?”

“ Wolf-boy said I only had one arrow I could use. And while you were trying to knock out Short-stuff, I went searching for the poison. He said I could use that too.”

“ Do you have a nickname for everyone?” Leave it to John to go completely off track.

“ Do you have to be so annoying?”

“ I’m only saying. It just seems like you have a nick named for everyone.”

“ I call you by your last name! Now pass me the poison.”

At that moment the bird blinked hard at me before it decided it needed to be above the ground. It flew over to me and sat, of all things, on my injured shoulder. I couldn’t tell what it was doing because the only thing I could see was its tail feathers… and it was lifting them up ever so slightly. That’s when I began to pray that it wasn’t about to go toilet on me. But then its body began to glow gold and I heard the familiar cackle turn into the musical notes of a softly played lyre. What was even weirder was that I could hear the bird singing it.

The next thing I knew was that my shoulder went completely numb and the now pure gold raven had taken wing once more. I watched the bird circle around my head a couple of times before it shot out of the room. Only, it wasn’t a bird any more. It was more like a streak of golden light that passed through the back door like an arrow. I should have made the connection right there and then, but for some stupid reason I didn’t realise until we were on the road again. Outside, I heard someone scream out in pain and I realised that the poisoned arrow had been guided to its mark. Apollo had helped us… but it wasn’t how the prophecy had foretold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DRC = Dirty Rotten Cop


End file.
